LIBRARY 

OF   THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


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373  WASHINGTON  STREET. 


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POEMS 

OF 

PERSONALITY 

SECOND  SERIES 

REGINALD  C.  ROBBINS 


—  "  to  speak  beyond  tbe  book 


CAMBRIDGE 

at  Qfyt  Etomfa* 

1909 


NIVERSn  Y) 

or  / 


COPYRIGHT,   1909,   BY   REGINALD   CHAUNCEY  ROBBINS 
ALL  RIGHTS   RESERVED 


; 
P? 


CONTENTS 

CONFUCIUS .      3 

HERACLITUS 9 

AESCHYLUS         1 8 

PARMENIDES 24 

PHIDIAS 29 

EURIPIDES 38 

SOCRATES 45 

SOPHOCLES 54 

PLATO 62 

ARISTOTLE 73 

ASOKA 86 

PAUL 91 

PETER 100 

CONSTANTINE 104 

ATHANASIUS no 

AUGUSTINE 117 

iii 


185461 


CONTENTS 

AVERROES 123 

AQUINAS 131 

LUTHER 143 

LOYOLA 149 

XAVIER 155 

PALESTRINA.     .    ,    ,     .    ..    , 162 

AKBAR 168 

SHAKESPEAR      .     .     , 174 

DESCARTES 180 

SPINOZA 188 

KANT .     .  197 

MRS.  BROWNING 213 

CARLYLE 215 


iv 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

SECOND  SERIES 


ERRATA 

POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY    (FIRST  SERIES) 

ist,  2nd,  and  3rd  editions  — 
Page  82,  line  12  \ 

and  >  for  Giqeb  read  Ga^a. 

Page  88,  line  3    ) 

ist  and  2nd  editions  only  — 
Page  116,  line  8  —  for  the  read  in. 

ist  edition  only  — 
Page  80,  line  i  —  for  relea  read  release. 


U  N  !  V  E  k  *  '• 


CONFUCIUS 

ALACK !  down  from  the  Golden  Years  of  Kings 
Perfect  in  every  enterprise  of  life 
And  Sages  calm  in  benison  of  Shang-te, 
Unto  the  turmoil  of  these  latter  days, 
This  modern-made  forgetfulness  of  earth, 
What  lapse,  degeneration  !  And  the  fall 
Continues  with  the  passing  of  the  days ; 
And  Princes  lift  the  sword  against  their  kind, 
And  none  are  Kings.   And  no  superior  man 
Is  counsellor ;  nor  folk  obedient 
Anywhere  bear  in  mind  the  Rule  of  Shun, 
Nor  guide  their  ways  by  the  Proprieties, 
Nor  sacrifice  by  ceremonial 
Exact,  nor  regulate  by  music-mood 
Nor  holy  ode,  conduct  and  character. 
But  all,  both  high  and  low,  demand  new  modes 
Of  turmoil,  new  disorder ;  whilst  this  sun 
Rises  and  sets,  and  stars  upon  their  course 
Move  nightly,  marking  our  disease  and  death. 
I  have  made  study  of  the  Golden  Years, 
Their  lore  of  order  and  their  ways  of  worth 
Perfect,  plain-fashion 'd  ;  whence  am  well  aware 
3 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

How,  might  but  men  return  unto  those  laws 
Of  firm  obedience  in  both  home  and  State, 
Of  wise  command,  submission  questionless, 
By  king  or  husband,  subject,  yea,  or  wife, 
Then  might  the  rebel  or  the  concubine 
Garrulous,  lustful,  be  unknown  among  us ; 
And  government  be  peaceful,  taxes  just, 
And  many  sons  be  born  to  reverence 
Both  parents  equally.   Hence  would  I  teach 
This  Middle  Kingdom,  centre  of  the  skies, 
With  sure  authority  the  method  of  them 
Celestial,  absolute ;  that  so  might  men 
Re-live  the  ancient  dignity  of  life, 
And  stand  re-born  as  on  the  pristine  earth 
And  be  of  Golden  Years,  or  slaves  or  kings. 
I  am  so  fain  to  teach,  yet  nowhere  find 
Right  opportunity ;  but  fear  my  faith 
Will  fade  unheard  when  death  o'ertaketh  me 
(My  creed,  of  destiny  too  like  mine  own  !) 
And  none  after  myself  be  bless'd  to  know  — 
For  what  disciple  can  preserve  a  truth 
Without  example  in  my  private  life 
Which  some  successful  government  alone 
Under  my  counsel  could  afford  to  him  ?  — 
4 


CONFUCIUS 

None  bless'd  to  know  the  truth  establish 'd  by 
The  fair  performance  of  the  Golden  Kings. 

'Sooth,  in  these  days  of  turbid  insolence 
When  nought  is  order'd  in  authority, 
But  hearts  are  bruised  and  broken  with  despair 
Of  learning  each  some  novelty  to  suit 
The  strain  and  stress  of  untoward  circumstance, 
Stands  this  my  novelty  and  my  despair 
That  nowhere  men  may  heed  the  precept  wise, 
The  proof  irrefutable  which  I  tell  them 
Glean 'd  of  the  wisdom  of  the  greater  age 
Before  all  things  grew  old  and  tottering. 
And  I  myself  grow  old  and  tottering 
To  leave  no  high  example  of  success, 
Who  feel  my  very  faith  a  failure  here 
Where  few  believe  ;  and  I,  alone  of  all 
Wise  in  the  sanction  of  authority, 
Wield  no  authority  —  though  yet,  by  grace 
Of  circumstance,  set  for  the  space  of  moons 
Over  this  province-government  to  try 
The  fresh  enforcement  of  the  earlier  ways. 
Nor  will  this  folk  obey,  nor  will  he  heed 
Whose  counsellor  by  compact  I  became. 
5 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

But  all  goes  on  from  bad  to  worse  by  want 
Of  that  antique  respect  and  reverence 
Which  record  of  the  wisdom-ways  of  Kings 
Abundantly  reveals,  but  is  not  now. 
How  shall  I  bear  to  go  into  my  grave 
A  savior  still  unseen  in  public  power, 
A  wealth  of  wisdom,  doom'd  as  ignorance 
To  die  and  nevermore  be  known  of  men 
By  fair  performance  as  of  Golden  Kings  ? 

Ah  !  who  could  quench  the  fervor  of  our  crime  ? 

Could  Shun  himself,  fallen  on  latter  days, 

Have  transform'd  earth   to  heaven,  made   mankind, 

Shang-te  ? 

Though  every  man  perchance  be  good  at  heart, 
Born  good  ;  yet  more  than  all  the  Sages'  selves 
Were  needed  to  make  perfect  man  born,  both, 
And  bred  to  lust  and  greed  by  age  mature. 
As  I  believed  and  labor'd,  so  might  Shun ; 
And  as  I  fail'd,  so  haply  would  Shun  fail, 
Whose  faith,  pride,  wisdom  were  scarce  more  than  mine  ! 
Scarce  more  than  mine  !  And  as  Shun  stands  to-day 
Criterion  of  perfection,  so  may  I 
To  future  ages,  if  no  fault 's  confess'd, 

6 


CONFUCIUS 

Stand  model  and  exemplar,  teaching  men 
The  way  of  me,  Kung-fu-tze,  as  of  them 
The  earlier  Sages  —  ay,  and  serve  mankind  ! 
For  where  is  opportunity  to  help, 
There  pride  is  justified  ;  and  unto  pride 
With  claim  of  self-success  cleaves  reverence ; 
And  where  is  reverence  there  all  is  saved  ; 
And  saviorhood  proves  the  superior  man  !  — 
Yet  from  this  pitiful  experience 
Of  practical  failure  I  perforce  resign, 
Throw  down  the  staff  of  office  and  retire 
To  some  sole  hermitage  to  meditate 
The  better  fortune  of  the  Golden  Days 
When  wisdom  was,  a  better  fortune  proven 
By  mine  experience  of  modern  life 
So  purposeless  without  authority, 
So  warp'd  and  thwarted  of  accomplishment 
For  want  of  any  ancient  self-restraint 
And  plain  obedience  to  command  of  Kings. 
For  where  there  is  not  any  self-restraint 
There  nought  is  regulated  ;  and  where  nought 
Is  regulated  there  no  government 
Exists  worth  preservation ;  and  where  earth 
Is  nowise  govern'd  no  superior  man 
7 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Can  safely  intervene  to  found  the  State. 

I  shall  abandon  service  publicly 

And  give  myself  to  setting  forth  in  script 

The  evils  annall'd  of  their  Springs,  their  Autumns, 

Which  are  not  years  of  singleness  and  truth. 

By  my  book  be  I  judged  ;  but  be  forgot 

As  conservator  crazed  who  cried  reform 

Yet  could  not  quench  the  fervor  of  our  crime, 

Could  not  bring  back  the  Golden  Years  of  Kings  !  - 

Was  it  not  fault  of  mine,  to  strive  beyond 
All  possibility  of  world-success  ? 
Was  not  crime  mine  that  I  defied  our  fate, 
Sought  to  turn  backward  on  earth's  destiny 
Which  goeth  ever  onward  though  we  fall  ? 
Which  if  we  thwart  we  must  deserve  to  fall ; 
Which  if  we  foster  yields  our  life's  success, 
And  thereby  proves  itself  desirable, 
More  perfect  than  the  Ceremonials 
Of  Shun,  more  sweet  than  old  Proprieties  ?  — 
Yet,  be  mine  Annals  as  mine  eloquence 
Confident  still  of  favor  with  the  skies  ! 


HERACLITUS 

BEHOLD  the  world  as  man  perceiveth  it 
(O  world  !  thou  source  of  every  thought  of  truth  !) 
Call'd  fire,  or  water,  earth  or  any  name 
For  somewhat  static,  moveless,  even  though  man 
Himself  be  judge  of  it  that  flux  be  all ! 
Behold  the  world,  as  though  perception  might  be 
Some  passive  permanence,  some  plethora 
Of  recognition  mutually  inane, 
Devoid  of  meaning,  imperceptible 
Because  all-unimpressive  !   Yet  mine  arm 
Before  mine  eyes  passeth  from  point  to  point 
Athwart  yon  landscape  (ay,  o'er  Ephesos, 
Artemis'  precinct !) ;  and  by  motion  proveth 
A  relativity  dynamic  'twixt 
My  sight  and  world  as,  still  within  them  both, 
Its  sweep  impresseth  alterance  on  the  face 
Of  the  world ;  and  by  its  passage  o'er  the  world 
Becomes  unlike  itself,  mine  arm  no  more 
As  erst,  but  arm  and  world  at  once  made  new 
And  by  their  novelty  impressing  on  me 
Flux,  flux,  and  flux  unto  the  end  of  time. 
Why  then  denominate  or  world  or  water 
9 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Or  fire  or  earth  or  arm  with  any  name 

Intended  to  denote  a  permanence, 

Implying  some  perception  unimpressed 

And  hence  impossible  ?   Truth  were  not  so. 

And  therefore  fire  and  earth  as  men  conceive  them 

Are  not.   But  flux  are  all  things  that  we  know ; 

And  '  world  '  or  '  life '  names  but  the  flux  as  whole. 

The  wonder  is  not,  therefore,  of  the  way 
Life  floweth  and  is  absolved  within  itself 
With  every  fresh  desire  —  for  how  impress 
Perception  save  by  impact ;  and  how  else 
Might  motion  be,  save  by  the  alterance 
Unending,  irremediable  of  time  ? 
The  wonder  is  not  of  the  way  we  pass, 
Are  born  and  are  forgotten  with  the  dead. 
Rather  were  alterance,  the  flux  of  change 
World's  axiom,  and  physics  every  way 
(The  Upward  and  the  Downward  Burning  both) 
Built  in  our  understanding  how  we  move 
And  breathe  and  face  the  morrow  as  we  must. 
Necessity,  for  flux.   And  what  we  know 
For  necessary  ne'er  bemarvelleth. 
The  wonder,  rather,  that  we  seem  to  stay  ; 
10 


HERACLITUS 

Are  here,  one  moment ;  there,  at  other  while  ; 
'Stablish'd  and  resting  as  we  somehow  seem. 
The  wonder,  so,  that  any  element  — 
Or  very  fire,  or  water,  or  dull  earth  — 
Remaineth  very  fire,  water,  earth, 
And  not  another ;  how  each  element 
Seems  untransmutive,  hath  identity 
Whether  it  be  or  not-be,  though  each  thing 
Can  neither  be  nor  not-be,  but  (becoming !) 
In  some  sort  must  amalgamate  with  each 
And  every  other,  as  the  law  of  all 
Requires,  whose  fundament  is  alterance  ! 
From  this  dilemma  there  were  no  appeal 
To  proof  of  gods.   The  gods  (if  gods  there  be  !) 
Either  abiding  still  beyond  space,  time, 
And  sharing  not  in  motion  ;  or  elsewise 
Being  but  motions  of  the  myriad  world 
Call'd  archetypal,  alterance  none  the  less  ! 
And  either  way  were  they  beyond  appeal  — 
For,  being  unmotion'd,  were  they  nought  to  point 
This  paradox  of  stillness  seemingly  ; 
Or,  being  (as  needs  were,  were  they  anywise  !) 
Themselves  but  movements  of  the  world  at  large, 
Were  they  but  type  and  formula  indeed 
ii 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

Of  this  my  proposition,  not  themselves 
Solutions  of  the  mighty  mystery  ! 
For  how  were  Zeus,  a  motion,  seeming  Zeus 
Through  countless  ages  ;  Artemis  herself, 
The  symbol  of  life-lapse  by  local  creed, 
Continuously  Artemis,  nought  else  ? 
Gods,  elements  or  men,  beasts,  trees,  or  all 
Alike,  true  chaos  of  unceasing  flux, 
Yet  paradoxically  Zeus,  earth,  fire, 
Artemis,  air,  oak,  Herakleitos,  each  ! 

Lo  !  were  it,  by  some  possibility, 

A  bare  necessity  beyond  escape 

That  somewhat,  still  unchanging,  lurks  within 

The  maelstrom  of  the  fluxion  ;  gives  a  name 

To  each  momentum  ;  that  beyond  the  breath 

Of  birth-in-death  affords  identity 

To  recognition  ?  Were  it,  that  I  take 

An  hidden  axiom  and  reluctantly 

Accept  a  fundament  occult  till  now  ? 

Urge  I  not  every  hour  that  what  we  see 

For  bare  necessity  were  understood 

Beyond  necessity  to  understand  ? 

And  prove  I  not  both  terms  of  axiom  — 

12 


HERACLITUS 

The  status,  as  the  fluxion  —  equally 
Prime  datum  of  the  world  wherein  we  move  ? 
The  movement  and  the  mover !  —  Yet  wherein 
Were  paradox  precluded,  that  we  say : 
I  move,  Zeus  moveth  ;  earth  is  earth  ;  and  water 
Water ;  as  fire,  fire  though  it  melt 
And  pass  in  every  flickering  ?   How  might  Zeus 
Be  to  his  motion,  I  unto  mine  arm's 
Translation  show  related,  when  '  itself ' 
Must  be,  as  by  hypothesis,  without 
Share  in  self-passage  nor  defined  by  change 
Of  relativity  to  all  things  else  — 
Though  of  itself  nought  if  it  may  not  move  ? 
And  what  of  alterance  then  when  passage-fact 
Precludes  intrinsic  inference  of  aught 
Moveless,  unpassing  ?    If  relation  lie 
In  truth  'twixt  state  and  state,  and  such  we  call 
Motion ;  yet  what,  within  such  mystic  stream, 
The  very  self-distinctiveness  of  flux 
From  each  self-state  as  state,  which  cannot  be 
As  state  determinate  of  passingness 
Which  could  demark  it  but  impermanently 
(Save  passingness  be  endless  emptiness  !) 
And  so  transform  it  into  flux  anew  ? 
13 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

If,  as  indeed  I  take  the  novel  truth, 
There  be  unceasingness  within  our  flow 
(Ha !  were  it  that  very  flow's  unceasingness 
Which  by  non-termination  yields  to  each 
Moment  and  aspect  an  enduringness 
Inherent  only  for  the  fluxion's  self 
Its  universalness  of  reference, 
And  cheats  us  with  supposed  identity 
Of  many  moments  joint-establishing !  ) 
Whereby  such  fluxion  shows  distinctively 
For  alterance  (requiring  permanence 
For  standard  and  criterion  !)  —  what,  within 
Such  duplex  datum  of  our  universe, 
Can  thus,  with  appeal  to  any  sanity, 
Be  said  of  such  relationship  as  lies 
'Twixt  alterance  and  change-nonentity, 
Whether  itself  were  fluxional  or  no  ? 
And  if  itself  's  shown  static  —  what  were  then 
Its  own  relationship,  as  status,  toward 
The  primal  fluxion  —  secondary  crux 
Interminably  self-repetitive 
In  logic-regress  beyond  man's  conceit  ? 
I  pause  before  such  paradox,  whose  terms 
Now  first  confront  me  among  sons  of  men, 
14 


HERACLITUS 

Now  first  demand  solution.   Future  years 
Shall  haply  see  solution  ;  haply  find 
The  task  impossible,  to  rectify 
Such  rift  within  Necessity,  the  One  !  — 

Yet  not  the  same  task,  not  such  paradox 
Precise  as  now  appalls  me  among  men 
The  first  and  therefore  last,  as  all  truths  flow : 
Necessity,  but  passingness  writ  large, 
Like  world  without  or  pause  or  permanency 
(So  reason  tells,  interpreter  of  sense 
In  just  perception  of  duplexity) 
Save  as  we  name  it  so,  we  know  not  wherefore, 
And  seize  the  simulacrum  to  explain 
The  shown  reality  —  and  call  it  Same, 
Though  unto  every  thought  respectively 
A  different  necessity-of-truth ! 
To  none  my  same  dilemma,  though  the  name 
Of  Herakleitos'  fluxion  aye  endure  ! 
Some  task  made  different  by  the  lapse  of  time, 
By  newer  information,  newer  needs 
Of  understanding  truth-necessity, 
Yet  seeming-same  within  their  universe 
Of  logic-wrought  procedure :  whereunto 
15 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Shall  many  minds  attain,  for  whom  my  fame 
Means  nought  than  early  rumor,  who  shall  stand 
Confronting,  seemingly  as  I  confront 
This  paradox.  And  many  shall  attempt 
Evasion,  or  delude  with  trickery. 
For  some  shall  say  :  The  paradox  disproves 
All  possibility  of  movement  made  — 
For  how  can  somewhat  pass  and  yet  be  same  ?  — 
Forgetful  how  this  motion  of  my  hand, 
Though  at  each  instant  status  in  itself 
(As  we  imagine  instance  cognizable  !) 
Yet  passes,  point  to  point,  perceptibly, 
And  proves  unto  perception,  truth's  best  judge, 
This  wonder-universe  of  earth,  of  water, 
Fire  and  Ephesos  within  my  sight, 
Known  thus  for  motion  all  though  each  bear  name  — 
Known  for  perceivers  each  (not  plethoras 
Of  blank  passivity  !)  beyond  all  doubt 
Even  as  I  (ha  !  might  the  changeless  I 
Resolve  all  paradox,  itself  that  knows 
Continuously  through  the  change  of  each 
Perception,  feeling  on  interminably 
Beyond  and  through  each  moment,  who  can  say  ?), 
Yea,  even  as  I  —  and  proving  thus  my  life 
16 


HERACLITUS 

Impression'd  of  a  world.  —  And  some  shall  cheat 
Themselves,  to  doubt  perception-reasoning 
And  base  truth  in  denial !   Yet,  O  world, 
Can  any,  sane,  deny  truth  were  of  thee  ? 


y^SCHYLUS 

THEY  murmur,  then,  that  I  (as  they  demur) 

Unmask  the  Mysteries,  declare  to  men 

Matters  beyond  the  scope  of  tragedy, 

From  speech  taboo'd,  perchance  precluded  from 

Mere  human  understanding  ?     Let  them  rail ! 

What  garland  could  be  grander  on  the  brows 

Of  victory  than  this  protestation  ?     Who 

Might  flatter  to  the  clouds  this  poetry, 

As  he  who  calls  my  name,  forsooth,  accursed 

For  blasphemy,  revealing  sacred  things  ? 

So  much  for  them,  the  mob,  who  only  praise 

When  most  denouncing.    Them  I  thank  with  scorn, 

Them,  too,  I  thank  that  they  have  subtlier  still 
Suggested  to  imagination  much 
Toward  some  yet  greater  work  than  they  deplore  ! 
Some  vision  of  a  gnarl'd  protagonist 
(As  some  bolt-stricken  oak  in  Tempe's  vale) 
Prometheus-like,  snatching  from  Zeus  for  men 
The  swift  fire-secret,  and  for  punishment 
(Even  as  the  oak  by  disembowelling) 
Suffering  vast  maltreatment,  though  at  soul 
18 


AESCHYLUS 

But  more  confirm 'd  in  mighty  righteousness 
By  each  injustice.     Only  let  the  mob 
Threat  but  my  life  on  Areopagos, 
Torment  me  round  with  clamor  — that  my  heart 
Be  wrath-inflamed  to  rigor  —  and  I  '11  make 
The  master-piece :  the  Master-Hero  Bound 
Defiant  and  triumphant :  Gods  and  all 
Belittled  by  the  unswerved  suffering  Man  — 
The  suffering  Man  unswerved,  the  soul  at  last 
Of  tragedy  and  heart  of  holiest  song 
Triumphant  by  distress  over  all  Gods  ! 
The  master-music  :  though  the  veil  be  rent ; 
And  high  Olympos,  mere  earth-mount  at  last, 
Cast  down  Zeus'  throne  before  the  feet  of  men, 
Doff  every  vestige  of  eternal  snow  — 
And  flower  with  thyme  and  honey ;  to  the  taste 
Of  every  soul  a  liberation,  though 
Come  sorrow  with  responsibility, 
Come  suffering  with  the  fresh  awakening : 
The  pain  of  parting  from  the  father-care 
Of  God  Olympian,  seen  at  last  in  truth 
A  tyranny  and  nobly  cast  aside  ! 
Such  my  Prometheus.  — Let  them  rail  at  that 
(Come  Dionysia-season)  an  they  will ! 
19 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

For  me  an  inspiration ;  and  for  them 
Boar-baiting,  bull-bewildering  as  with  goads ; 
Prometheus  shall  be  :  man  exposing  all 
(The  sacredest,  most  holily  taboo'd, 
The  most  mysterious)  to  the  sight  of  man 
And  men's  instruction ;  that  an  holier  truth 
(That  secret  of  the  breast  Promethean, 
The  doom  of  Zeus  for  all  his  tyranny  !) 
Rise  from  the  ashes  and  establish  us 
In  sacredness  if  not  in  mystery, 
In  consecration  and  an  open  heart. 

And  yet  —  might  any  Order  be  not  Zeus, 
He  of  the  Law  ?    Is  there  a  law  beyond 
Law's  full  impersonation  ?   And  if  such 
There  seem  (those  Moirai,  dread  Eumenides 
Of  myth),  swells  not  the  name  and  thought  calPd  Zeus 
To  fill  the  perfected  requirement  ? 
Might  I,  save  for  some  Areopagos 
Protective  from  the  momentary  spite 
Of  mobs  impulsive,  with  impunity 
Assail  the  old-time  myth-authorities ; 
Save,  as  I  say,  for  force  conservative, 
The  middle-source  of  justice,  tyrant  still 

20 


AESCHYLUS 

Over  the  reckless  demos-novelty  ? 

Shall  I  be  wrath  demotic  tearing  down 

All  institution,  when  but  Institute 

Alone  gives  warrant  of  free  thought  and  speech  ? 

Prometheus  hath  taken  indeed  a  shape 

Such  as  my  wrathful  mood  against  the  mob 

Of  archaists  impell'd,  such  as  my  right 

To  mouth  deep-searching  and  wild-winged  words 

Demanded  in  assertion ;  but  shall  mine 

Half-misconception  bide  as  Titan  bound, 

Binding  mine  art,  cramping  mine  utterance  still 

To  mere  defiance  and  self-petulance 

Protestive,  when  to  act  constructively, 

Upbuilding  and  establishing,  were  best ; 

And  best  were  to  abide  with  justice  yet 

Staunch  partisan  of  Zeus,  who,  though  he  grow 

A  greater  Zeus,  were  Areopagite 

Still,  an  establish'd  custom  from  the  first  ? 

It  is  because  I  did  accept  the  myth 

Erroneously  indicating  Zeus 

For  interloper  that  I  fail'd  to  feel 

Futurity  for  his ;  but  now  I  see 

The  Zeus-succession  but  the  Chronos-rule 

From  first,  the  Zeus-anticipation  in 

21 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

The  old  pre-Titan  forcefulness.    And  thus 

Be  there  some  reconciliation  found 

At  last,  some  yielding  of  rigidity 

(Even  as  the  oak,  shear 'd  of  the  lightning-blast, 

May  skyward  rear  anew  some  crown  of  green 

And  the  blue  shine  down  and  be  but  heaven  the  more!); 

Some  Zeus-approximation  of  the  man 

Roused  to  a  wider-eyed  austerity 

Of  ripe  world-insight  recognizing  doom 

For  just  and  pardon  in  humility ; 

Some  earth-approximation  of  the  God, 

Humaner  by  the  conquest !    That  my  tongue 

Shall  sing  the  man's  unbinding  and  his  end 

In  stalwart  service  'neath  authority 

As  interceder  for  the  human  race  : 

The  Fire-Bearer,  Master-Foresight  Freed  — 

Whose  cult  obtains  throughout  our  Attika. 

And  thus  shall  this  my  trilogy  enhance 
The  potence  of  that  wise  authority 
Over  Athenai  exercised  by  them 
On  whose  defence  I  must  at  last  rely 
For  privilege  to  speak  whilst  speak  I  must ! 
Thus  shall  the  Gods  not  unassisted  sway 

22 


AESCHYLUS 

Athenai's  destinies,  but  by  my  song 
Of  songs  renew  authority  outworn 
Over  the  demos ;  and  these  archaists, 
Wholly  unjustified  of  blasphemy, 
Yet  win  by  will  of  mine  and  with  me  stand 
Leaders  conservative  to  teach  themselves 
How  truest  reverence  springs  in  freest  thought, 
In  freest  speech  anent  the  truths  of  earth  ; 
The  clear  conviction  (not  the  skeptic  rant) 
Found  in  most-revelation  —  trusting  Zeus 
To  test  of  any  searching,  any  proof ; 
Nor  veiled  in  jugglery  of  dark  taboo.  — 
'T  is  thus  that  I  reveal  the  Mysteries, 
Unmasking  with  my  mask  the  sacred  things  ! 


PARMENIDES 

ALTHOUGH  mine  Elea  be  a  little  town 
Unlike  Athenai,  yet  the  wide  world  all 
Is  nowise  larger  than  her  atomy  — 
Not  even  Athenai,  like  although  unlike  : 
This  strange  vast  city  whereto  mine  old-age 
Hath  come  to  wonder  at  her  ways  of  men. 
For,  were  aught  other  than  another  thing 
(Or  seas  or  men  or  cities  equally) , 
Were  then  nonentity  between  their  bounds 
'Soe'er  approximate  though  they  might  be. 
And  therefore  in  no  rational  intent 
Can  there  be  here  Athenai,  there  afar 
Elea,  though  the  journey  I  have  made  — 
Ah !  dogma  blessed  to  the  wanderer 
For  whom  an  Elea,  though  a  little  town, 
Is  birthplace ;  home-beloved,  being  an  hearth 
In  sooth,  Athenai  is  but  still  a  town, 
Yet  of  herself,  so  far  as  she  hath  truth 
Of  any  being,  is  she  as  the  world  : 
And  I  yet  in  that  Elea,  though  I  came 
O'er  leagues  of  purple  ocean  to  be  here, 
24 


PARMENIDES 

And  there  no  longer.   Thus  indeed  I  fail 
Defeat  the  law  of  reason.   In  my  heart 
All  is  as  Elea  though  I  dwell  not  there, 
Though  if  in  space  and  time  I  seem  at  least 
Here  present.  Elea  was  a  little  town ; 
Yet  in  herself  teacheth  the  truth  of  things ! 

How  then  explain  the  semblance  that  I  came 
Even  from  Elea  to  arrive  at  last 
After  such  leagues  of  laboring  overseas 
In  strange  Athenai  ?    How  indoctrinate 
This  contrast,  to  the  clarity  of  truth  ? 
How  reconcile  this  lorn  nostalgia 
Of  him  the  old  man  wandering,  lonelily 
(I  laughed  at  it  in  new-come  colonists !), 
Lost  from  his  Elea  toward  yon  agora ; 
If  that  the  Elea  straining  at  his  heart 
Be  proof  that  neither  time  nor  space  hath  truth, 
But  all  is  still  but  Elea  and  the  years 
Of  youth  and  wisdom  and  the  praise  of  men  ? 
Perchance,  indeed,  that  unity  I  preach 
Were  this  of  yearning,  unforgetfulness, 
Presence  in  very  absence,  if  by  pain 
And  loss  in  separation  very  real  ? 
25 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

And  how  acknowledge,  how  construct  anew, 
Such  scheme  of  unity  noetical 
In  face  of  opposition  and  defeat  ? 
For  here  what  waits  me  ?   That  shrewd  Sokrates 
Whom  no  man  can  withstand,  whose  ruthless  test 
(So  I  have  heard  from  friends  who  urge  me  to  it) 
Is  soul-examination  (as  I  now 
Examine  self  perforce  !)  —  he  waits  for  me 
Even  in  that  agora  to  try  my  truth 
By  his  new  method  (so  unlike  mine  own 
Before  this  hour),  to  examine  me 
(Himself  a  young  man;  beautiful,  no  doubt, 
As  every  god-like  intellect  implies), 
Alas  —  and  find  nostalgia  writ  large 
Upon  my  spirit  contradicting  clean 
The  world's  illusiveness  to  men  of  reason, 
Elea's  unity  with  all  things  here  !  — 
How  have  I  erst  been  wont  to  reason  with 
Some  skeptical  disciple ;  how,  denounce 
The  counter-dogma  of  the  Ephesian  sage  ? 
Let  me  rehearse,  and  reassure  myself 
Therewith,  the  folly  of  the  counter-creed 
Which  Herakleitos  foisted  on  the  world, 
The  craze  of  contradiction  !  —  How  become 
26 


PARMENIDES 

(How  not-be  in  the  moment  that  we  seem  ?) 
When  truth  is,  and  is-not  's  nonentity  ?  — 

Ay,  so  oft-time  the  formula  hath  served 
Whilst  all  was  at  the  acme  and  the  world 
Was  yet  in  fact  but  Elea  unto  me ; 
And  nought  was  known,  save  as  by  vague  report, 
Of  league-on-league  of  weltering,  or  the  sense 
Of  oceans  intervening,  or  the  sight 
Of  strangers  cold-contain 'd  and  arrogant, 
Indifferent  to  Elea  as  to  aught 
Beyond  their  agora  :  themselves  at  home 
As  I  in  Elea  ;  their  unity 
With  me,  worst  mockery  !   Did  Ephesos 
Vomit  her  sage,  a  corpse,  upon  these  streets 
To  gibber  of  death-throes  and  the  charnel-house 
(Dread  proofs  of  scarce-illusive  alterance  !), 
I  were  not  more  unnerve'd,  shaken  at  soul, 
To  meet  with  Sokrates  and  speak  with  him. 
I  should  have  wiped  away  the  universe 
Consistently  with  qualities  of  sense, 
To  wean  me  of  this  Elea  inwardly, 
Before  I  undertook  to  cross  the  seas ! 
And  is  not  Elea  quality  of  sense  ? 
27 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Yet  how  maintain  the  doctrine,  when  at  heart 
By  this  new  method,  self-examining, 
Which  omen-like  forewarneth  me  of  him  — 
Gnaweth  a  contradiction  worse  than  death 
Which  will  not  as  a  ghost  be  laid  away, 
But  as  a  Fury  feasts  upon  my  frame  ! 
How  can  illusion  warrant  me  these  throes 
Of  yearning  homewardly,  whilst  nevermore 
Perchance  shall  any  save  the  inward  eye 
Behold  that  Elea,  town  where  I  was  born : 
Which  is  not  as  Athenai  ?  — Ah,  here  comes 
(With  Zenon,  my  disciple,  urging  on) 
A  lout  so  ugly  that  I  laugh  at  him  — 
Not  Sokrates,  surely !  I  had  never  dream 'd 
A  visitant  so  ludicrous.  —  Ah,  well ! 
If  there  be  any  truth  of  Unity, 
No  Reason  can  be  in  a  shape  so  crude, 
So  unlike  Zenon  or  Parmenides, 
So  utterly  unlike  the  wisdom-form 
Of  gracious  balance,  proud  benignity ! 
None  in  mine  Elea  are  so  dull  as  this  one, 
Doubtless.  Our  Elea  shall  have  victory ! 


28 


PHIDIAS 

THE  Gods  are  working  with  me  as  I  work ; 
I,  Pheidias,  sculptor ;  helpmate  of  the  man 
Perikles :  maker  of  the  homes  of  Gods, 
These  temples ;  sponsor  to  the  homes  of  men, 
This  town  Athenai  and  Akropolis. 
The  Gods  are  working  with  me  here  on  high 
In  air  above  Athenai,  where  the  fane 
Of  Parthenon  already  rears  around 
The  Form  chryselephantine.     Round  the  Form 
Athena  :  virgin  matron,  patroness 
Of  the  City-State,  preceptress  of  the  mind 
Of  man :  concentres  all  the  orb  of  earth, 
From  Babylon  to  Aithiopia, 
Cold  Chersonesos  or  the  Hesperides. 
And  very  near  around  me  and  this  Form 
(Hid  from  my  workshop  only  by  these  walls 
Of  Parthenon,  and  unto  memory  clear) 
Lie  glittering  Ilissos,  Lykabettos 
Where  Phoibos  riseth  in  this  summer-time, 
And  broad  Hymettos  with  its  dusky  green. 
And,  closer  yet  (though  whither  wearying  sun 
Sinks  to  his  rest),  springs  Areopagos 
29 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Where  weighty  words  still  sway  the  destinies 
Of  life  and  death  in  matters  of  our  State. 
And  yonder  (through  these  walls  I  picture  them 
Sun-sparkling)  lie  Phaleron  and  the  port 
Peiraieus;  and,  though  further  westwardly, 
The  way  Eleusis-ward  (mysterious  site, 
Emblem  of  piety)  along  the  plain 
Between  the  hills  and  'mid  the  almond-groves. 
The  world  of  human  power  or  sacred  hope 
Alike  concentres  with  me  and  this  Form. 
Mine  art  embodies  in  the  name  of  earth 
(Material,  practical,  political : 
As  reverent)  all  that  wisdom  which,  without 
Athena  for  demonstrance,  were  as  breath 
Too  subtle  for  the  senses,  unlike  earth 
And  therefore  nought  for  men  material, 
Void  as  a  chaos  for  our  politic.  — 
There  are  who  doubt  them  even  of  the  Gods, 
Holding  the  final  truth  mere  fire  or  air. 
Some  few  the  hypercritical  deny 
Athena ;  and  deserve  the  poison-cup 
For  State-corruption  and  seditioning. 
And  yet  no  poison-cup  would  still  them  quite, 
No  punishment  which  breeds  a  sympathy 
30 


PHIDIAS 

Eradicate  the  sacrilegious  rant ; 

Only  the  clear  conviction  of  mine  art 

As  fundamental  pedagogic  fact 

Embodying  Godhood,  giving  unto  men 

Proof  positive  (practical,  political : 

As  reverent)  of  a  true  divinity 

Beyond  all  myth  and  legend.   Let  the  myth 

Elude  belief—-  no  piety  need  fear 

To  fall  with  that !   I  turn  and  men  shall  turn 

Unto  Athena  sculptured  by  my  hand 

Here  in  her  temple  on  Akropolis  — 

And  must  believe.   I  work  with  my  mere  hand 

As  the  man  Perikles  commanded  me 

To  help  to  rear  Athenai,  fit  abode 

For  Gods  or  men.   But,  whilst  my  chisel  plies 

And  flakes  of  ivory  plate  leap  in  the  light, 

I  know  the  Gods  are  Gods  by  virtue  of 

This  beauty  of  chryselephantine  Form.  — 

The  Gods  are  working  with  me  as  I  work.  — 

Completed !  —  Truth  perfected  ;  no  stroke  more 
To  make  ?  —  Hand  wearies  and  the  chisel  falls 
In  a  moment  cold  and  dulPd.    And  all  were  as 
The  Gods  were  not;  Athena  were  a  doubt; 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Athenai  some  ephemera ;  and  myself, 
'SpoiFd  of  my  body's  power,  suddenly 
Widely  awaked  in  mind,  as  skeptic  too ! 
I,  for  the  nonce  as  the  young  Sokrates ; 
Strangely  akin  in  new  bewilderment 
To  Anaxagoras  who  makes  of  thought 
The  Gods'  thin  effigy  in  place  of  stone ; 
Parmenides  and  their  unholy  rout 
Who  work  no  beauty,  but  disturb  our  faith 
With  pleading,  counter-pleading  of  the  case 
Man  had  no  right  to  enter  against  Gods  — 
Even  though  brought  on  Areopagos  !  — 
Against  the  Gods  who  only  ask  of  men 
Belief  and  piety  and  workfulness 
Unto  the  archetypal  truth  of  Form 
Which  cannot  be  of  fire  or  thought  or  air ! 
Alas !  I  suddenly,  as  Sokrates, 
As  any  Eleatic  anciently 
(All  alike,  whatsoe'er  the  teaching,  false 
To  any  illustration  outwardly 
Of  presence  and  proportion,  ay,  to  art) 
Question  the  clear  conviction ;  from  my  hand 
Let  fall  with  the  cold  tool  my  piety, 
My  loyalty  to  him,  that  Perikles ; 
32 


PHIDIAS 

My  serviceableness  to  City-State  !  — 
Serve  I  the  State  so  truly  then  who  carve 
The  solid  semblance  to  persuade  the  world 
Unto  belief  I  fear  may  be  but  myth, 
Myth  only,  and  no  universal  truth  ? 
The  chisel  falls  from  the  fingers;  cold  and  dull'd 
It  lies  in  the  silvery  flakes ;  and  with  it  lies 
My  spirit,  vacant  of  divinity. 
The  Form  still  stands  a  form  material, 
Material  only,  meaningless  anent 
Truth  archetypal.   I  have  rear'd  above 
Athenai  but  some  domicile  of  power 
To  tyrannize  upon  the  souls  of  men ; 
Some  image  born  of  force,  projected  of 
Mine  overweening  blind  credulity  — 
Ignorant  of  the  nature  of  myself  — 
And  Perikles'  persuasion.   Tyrants  must 
Conserve  the  Gods  unto  their  own  support ; 
Delude  the  demos  to  mistake  mere  form, 
The  physical  body,  for  what  lies  beyond 
Physics :  the  fiction  of  the  judging  mind 
(The  mind,  which  ne'er  were  perfect  nor  complete, 
But  hath  its  being  by  some  form-of-growth 
And  therefore  cannot  finish  and  lose  faith 
33 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

As  now  I  fail  of  heart  in  finishing !), 
Which  weighs  my  sculpture  unto  aimlessness, 
Denies  it  purpose  and  excuse  to  be 
Save  as  it  serve  at  worst  some  archetype 
Of  purpose  formative  not  in  the  Form. 
And  any  purpose,  if  the  Gods  but  fall, 
Condemns  my  huge  Athena  either  way.  — 
I  doubt  me  if  there  be  in  truth  a  God  ! 
It  is  in  truth  as  one  or  two  have  said, 
Endanger'd  for  their  wise  temerity ! 
'T  is  true  the  mind  is  verily  a  form 
Quite  unlike  matter  (leaving  matter  nought 
But  inchoate  formlessness  —  as  now  I  sense 
This  Anaxagoras !)  ;  and  the  over-mind, 
The  formal  mind  of  all,  hath  in  it  nought 
Of  frame  material,  but  breath  alone, 
Fire  or  feeling,  as  the  doctrine  goes  ! 
What  then  am  I  with  this  Athena's  frame  ? 
A  child,  a  plaything  of  this  Perikles, 
A  prostitute  to  plans  political, 
A  maker  of  impostures !   If  as  men 
Our  bodies  be  but  clogs  upon  the  soul, 
But  prisons  of  the  spirit,  as  rumor  saith, 
Is  there  an  art  at  all  still  worthy  of 
34 


PHIDIAS 

A  man's  endeavor ;  when  his  every  hope 

Should  be  to  rid  his  aspiration  from 

The  deadweight  of  the  tenement  of  clay  ? 

(The  Eleusinians  give  some  hint  of  this.) 

The  poets  may  be  mightier  than  I 

With  all  the  crimes  of  their  impieties ; 

And  but  because  they  sing  earth  incomplete, 

Life  tragic  and  imperfect :  Aischylos 

Or  Sophokles  alike  leaving  a  world 

Which,  beautiful  but  in-the-making,  stands 

Fit  to  be  ever  new,  though  Godlessly. 

Philosophers  may  soon  be  born  of  men 

Who,  surer  than  the  surest  yet  of  them, 

Shall  yield  irrefragable  logic-form 

To  doctrines  of  their  immaterial 

Formative  verity — and  leave  me  here, 

Me  and  my  works  with  wreck  of  all  the  Gods, 

An  outgrown  childhood,  plaything  thrown  aside 

Even  with  Athenai  and  Akropolis 

While  the  world  centres  in  some  other  sphere.  — 

The  Gods  are  perfect,  fmish'd — with  my  work! 

The  Gods  with  me  are  weary,  as  I  lie ! 

Ah !  but  the  Form  chryselephantine — see, 
35 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Yon  line  unbeautiful :  not  modell'd  quite 

Unto  the  archetype  I  feel  in  me 

(Unfmishable,  imperfectible !), 

The  searching  wisdom  of  the  frame  divine, 

Itself  at  growth  within  me  as  I  breathe 

And  move  and  have  my  being  of  its  power, 

Demanding  imitation  in  the  clay 

Interminably  to  its  modelling : 

Which  thus  alone  is  anywise  transfused. 

One  hour's  brief  laboring  will  set  that  right 

(As  near  as  man  may  e'er  achieve  an  end 

Which  groweth  in  itself  unendingly) 

Eternally  as  no  man  than  myself 

(Not  Polykleitos,  he  the  strong  and  new), 

Labor  he  ne'er  so  many,  many  days, 

Might  ever  hope  to  render  it  correct !  — 

What  were  the  barren  breath-mentality, 

The  truth  of  air  or  fire,  were  not  we  men 

Of  frame  material  and  with  our  hands 

Laborers  to  embody  the  divine, 

If  only  point  by  point  interminably, 

In  archetypal  and  enduring  fact  ? 

We  are  the  children  of  the  Gods  indeed ; 

Our  works  are  playthings  of  divinity ; 

36 


PHIDIAS 

Perikles,  sponsor  to  Olympos  here ; 

And  I  by  inspiration  fitted  toward 

This  rectification  of  humanity. 

The  beauty  of  the  body :  it  is  man's  truth, 

Whereunto  each  high  thought,  though  thin  as  air, 

Nurtureth  and  approximates  the  frame 

Of  every  man  of  men  in  some  degree. 

What  though  the  beauty  grow  elusivewise 

Beyond  our  labor,  even  with  each  high  thought 

That  stimulates  the  sense  to  self-defeat  ? 

We  can  still  labor,  winning  truth  in  work 

So  long  as  work  is  to  us.  —  Whence  I  feel 

I  have  won  beauty  by  this  victory  now 

Over  impiety ;  can  grasp  this  tool 

Anew  to  more  assured  dexterity 

Toward  absolute  proportion  and  design. 

The  work  were  finish 'd  never,  though  we  fail 

And  cease.  The  hope  eternal  is  through  all : 

Wisdom,  the  maid  Athena,  matron  o'er 

The  glittering  city  on  Akrqpolis. 

The  Gods  leap  with  me  to  my  feet  afresh, 

Stoop  as  I  stoop,  and  grasp  the  keen-edged  tool ! 


37 


EURIPIDES 

WE  are  but  human,  and  the  human  fume 
Of  crime  and  passion  reeks  within  the  brain 
Pathetic,  tragic,  beautiful  by  proof 
Indeed  of  incompleteness  and  the  need 
Of  '  Gods '  and  '  Law  '  to  make  intelligent 
The  stultification.   We  indeed  are  men ; 
But  by  our  partial  manhood  must  imply 
An  over-humanhood,  a  *  God  '  o'er  all. 
And  therefore  doth  the  Godhood  through  our  griefs 
Gleam  forth  and  render  radiant  the  scene 
Of  daily  anguish  and  the  agony 
Of  incompletion  to  these  minds  and  hearts 
That  feel  a  oneness  deeper  than  the  dreams 
Of  love,  a  wider  heritage  than  hate, 
Yet  spend  by  doom  our  force  in  lust  and  wrath. 
But  therefore  are  our  passions  and  our  shames 
Sources  of  noble  wonder,  of  dismay, 
May  be,  but  of  an  hi^h  tranquillity, 
Of  speculation  through  infinitude. 
On,  therefore  !  be  the  tragedy  infused 
With  present  limitation,  let  the  theme 
Lift  itself  not  beyond  the  ways  and  words 
38 


EURIPIDES 

Of  poor  humanity,  that  through  those  ways 

Be  teaching  subtler,  surer  than  the  mode 

Of  dream  archaic,  than  the  dignity 

Of  great  discourse  without  the  throb  of  blood, 

Yea,  than  this  Sophokles'  serenity 

(His,  who  'd  ascribe  unto  unmoral  Gods 

The  fiat  that  absolves  mere  man  from  blame!), 

Scornful  of  sin,  ignorant  of  remorse  : 

Remorse,  self-blight  of  insufficiency !  — 

Medeia  !  be  thou  mad  amongst  thine  own, 

Slayer  of  thy  self-seed  in  blind  despair 

To  spite  world's  huge  injustice  :  that  all  men 

May  shrink  and  shudder,  take  the  truth  to  soul, 

And  so  learn  of  themselves,  achieve  the  law 

Of  self-distrust  and  be,  beyond  all  Gods 

(Trie  Gods,  but  men  impractical,  inane  !), 

Efficient  by  the  moderation ;  through 

The  rule  of  self-restraint,  all-powerful ! 

Another  (in  this  hesitation  now), 
Another  than  myself  (this  Sophokles  ? ) 
Had  fallen  on  recantation,  writ  the  Fates 
Large  over  this  Medeian  manuscript ; 
And  lost  the  tragic  conscience  out  of  all. 
39 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

He  had  implied  some  vast  ship-enginery 
Whereof  my  murderess  was  but  some  beam, 
Some  wavering  mast,  at  most  some  straining  cord 
Unwitting  of  the  wallow  and  the  gale 
That  drave  her,  her  the  blameless  ministrant 
Of  powers  beyond  the  ken  of  human  soul ; 
And  thus  had  saved  her  through  self-ignorance 
And  allegation  of  a  truth-unknown  : 
Strange  contradiction  !  Stranger  paradox 
Yet,  that  I,  by  admission  of  her  guilt 
Self-known  and  self-compell'd,  have  given  to  man 
Self-mastery  by  failure  self-imposed  ; 
Omniscience  by  denial  of  a  law 
Beyond  ourselves  :  as  we  are  source  of  law 
In  high  internal  conflict ;  in  ourselves 
Peace-recompensed  by  loss  of  our  peace  all !  — 
It  is  a  truth  new-earn'd  :  as  this  my  soul 
Is  new  and  earns  (as  all  this  Age  must  earn !) 
A  fresh-form'd  understanding.   Here  we  stand, 
Athenai  fronted  by  the  worst  of  wars, 
Which  unto  any  man  sane  and  aware 
Must  spell  in  the  end  disaster :  haply  then 
The  ruin  of  our  great  god-founded  State. 
And  what  shall  then  remain  unless  the  soul 
40 


EURIPIDES 

Be  its  own  theatre,  and  the  choral  ode 

Of  deep  endurance  'neath  the  ruin'd  rule 

Of  a  world  undone  rise  as  the  psean  now 

Sounds  in  the  stillness  of  an  Attic  sky 

Above  the  breathing  of  the  hearkening  throng  ? 

For  I  foresee  the  ruin  of  this  world 

Of  Perikles  and  proud  Aspasia 

At  hands  of  Lakedaimons,  Dorian  clods 

Who  only  by  their  heritage  of  tune 

(Longtime  transferr'd  unto  our  choristers) 

Are  better  than  the  brutes  or  have  in  them 

The  sweet  self-gratulation  of  an  art. 

But  therefore  stand  we  all  confronted  now 

With  opportunity :  to  base  our  hope, 

Not  in  the  unknown  God-imaginings 

Which  with  Athenai  ruin  finally 

But,  in  the  self-known  ruin  wherethrough  we  too, 

Though  slaughtering  these  children  of  our  brain 

And  heart  and  soul,  though  casting  unto  dogs 

These  gems  of  tragic  purport,  yet  shall  offer 

Ourselves  unto  the  world  forever  proven 

Of  purport  tragic  though  the  Gods  are  nought. 

And  thus  I  face  the  future  cataclysm 

With  my  Medeia  warning  all  mankind  — 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

These  people  of  Athenai  who  must  wake 
To  find  the  Fates  within  us  and  our  theme 
Of  beauty  born  anew  with  every  man 
Or  high  or  low  who  knows  within  himself 
The  ordered  conflict  conscientiously. 
This  we  must  know  who  soon  must  slay  with 

hands 

Our  offspring :  else  shall  we  be,  Spartan-like, 
Lost  to  ourselves  forever,  with  the  fall 
Of  Gods  and  heroes  as  the  Long  Walls  fall. 
I  prophesy ;  and  seek  to  leave  with  life 
Example  of  the  strength  within  the  soul, 
Which,  though  it  yield  to  savage  hate,  inspires 
The  truth  with  self-nobility,  and  lives  !  — 

Enough  for  life,  though  it  inflict  a  death 
Ennobling  in  itself  the  shame  and  sin  ; 
Enough  for  this  Athenai  which  with  throes 
Shall  fall  and  fling  to  ruin  Tragedy  : 
Athenai,  beautiful  if  only  fill'd 
With  passion  of  self-knowledge  whilst  it  slays. 
What,  too,  of  death,  if  Attika  must  die 
Even  as  Alkestis,  yielding  all  herself : 
That  world,  the  wider  if  less  worthy  State, 
42 


EURIPIDES 

May  linger  past  the  life  or  death  of  these  ? 

What  was  Alkestis  when  I  wrote  of  her  ? 

A  something  new  unto  the  sight  of  man  ? 

A  fond  return  to  life  forevermore 

By  virtue  of  the  death  vicarious  ? 

And  shall  some  wrestling  with  the  spirit  of  death, 

Some  soul-of-perishing  that  saves  all  things, 

Renew  for  all-time  this  Athenai  too, 

If  perishing  but  with  the  conscious  wish 

That  world  shall  pass  to  some  more-worthiness 

Over,  beyond  anything  She  hath  known  ? 

I  pause  before  the  threshold  of  the  thought  — 

I,  herald  of  new  eras  unto  men 

Of  pure  self-knowledge  though  Medeia  slay 

And  death  ensue  unto  the  very  soul ; 

Of  knowledge  purified  and  endless  life 

By  virtue  of  Alkestis,  the  new  thought 

Of  self-devotion  unto  death  achieving, 

Not  by  some  Fate  but  ever  beyond  Fate,  — 

Identifying  wisdom  with  the  selfhood 

Of  all  things  known  though  these  be  not  of 

self- 

A  victory  o'er  death  and  endless  life. 
Euripides  hath  enter'd  on  the  stage, 
43 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

And,  though  he  pass,  shall  leave  the  tragic  world 
Not  as  before,  but  human  holily ; 
More  faith-felt  by  avoidance  of  all  creed  ; 
And  thus  involving  Godliness  through  all. 


44 


SOCRATES 

WHETHER  it  be  the  voice  oracular, 
Possession  demoniacal ;  or  no  ? 
Whether  the  prompting  force  infallible 
Be  inspiration  ?  —  Let  me  meet  myself 
Abroad  as  in  some  spirit-agora, 
Stand  face  to  face  with  me,  greet  me  and 

pause 

Self-disputatious ;  holding  dialogue 
Silent,  alone  within  the  mind  of  me 
To  clear  the  question  of  equivocacy  ; 
Determining,  defining  mine  own  terms 
The  trulier  to  understand  the  point, 
This  question  of  divinity  in  me, 
The  source  of  insight  and  intelligence 
Where  reason  fails.   Ay,  let  me  reason  of  it 
As  with  those  casual  acquaintances 
Or  pupils,  forcing  freely  from  my  soul 
Her  premises,  her  preassumptive  truths 
Wherewith,  by  interplay  of  stimuli 
In  logic  dialectical,  to  prove 
Some  ultimate  position  tenable 
45 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

Anent  the  deity  within  the  man : 
Whether  mine  ignorance  be  sibylline  ! 

The  power  of  reason  and  its  limit  in  me  ? 
Man  holds  opinion,  goes  abroad  to  meet 
His  fellow,  finds  within  the  counter-man 
Counter-opinion ;  sets  to  reason  with  him 
(As  I  with  me  myself  in  singleness) 
Each  against  each ;  and  reaches  at  the  last 
Some  third  opinion,  fruit  of  all  that  toil. 
Grant  me,  the  third  opinion  is  the  best, 
Compounded  of  the  two  now  both  disproved 
(Light  born  of  darkness,  truth  of  two  untruths  — 
Small  satisfaction  !),  and  that  at  the  last 
Both  disputants  maintain  it,  each  in  sort, 
Though  haply  with  no  final  sympathy. 
Part  then  these  two,  and  go  their  different  ways 
Out  through  our  agora.  Each  meets  anew 
Some  disputant  and  sets  to  reason  with  him. 
Then  from  the  three  fresh-provable  untruths 
Arise  two  truths,  not  in  themselves  alike, 
Being  compounded  of  three  lies  distinct 
In  various  combination,  which  go  forth 
Into  the  world,  forever  losing  truth 
46 


SOCRATES 

By  fresh  compounding,  never  to  the  end 
Wholly  alike  (nay,  unlike  more  and  more  ?), 
Yet  each  true  to  the  soul  that  sweareth  it, 
And  all  (as  many  as  there  may  be  men  ?) 
Of  equal-seeming  self-authority ! 
So  to  our  reasoning  is  never  rest ; 
So  to  our  truth  come  echoes  of  untruth, 
Reverberations  from  the  primal  theme 
As  many  as  we  meet  and  teach  of  men. 
And  therefore  in  the  soul  as  many  dreams 
Of  half-truth  as  there  may  be  voices  in  us 
Of  man  or  god  testing,  protesting,  doubting, 
Questioning,  reasoning  of  our  premisings ; 
Ev'n  as  I  test  in  skeptic  singleness 
The  virtue  of  our  reason-faculty. 
Thus  test  the  premise  of  our  power  to  reason  • 
Conceivable  but  as  the  power  of  speech 
Within  to  bandy  half-truth  with  the  tongue 
Of  men  or  gods.   Can  such  an  instrument 
Of  untruth  and  of  inconclusiveness 
Determine  in  my  souPs-own  dialogue 
The  postulate  of  man  or  god  within  me 
(Whose  voice  hath  seem'd  so  demoniacal) 
To  supplement  the  range  of  this  same  reason 
47 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

And  yield  authority  where  reason  hath  none  ? 

A  clear  conception  of  the  difficulty 

(Won  in  the  bandying  of  words  within 

Self-antinomial,  interpreting 

Each  to  itself  by  alteration  through 

The  contact  self-conceptual),  the  problem  — 

The  reasoner  to  say  within  his  soul : 

By  right  of  reason  (bandyings  of  untruth 

Through  thousand  half-truths  !)  I  pronounce  him  true 

Or  false  (him  god  or  man)  who  speaks  beyond 

All  logic  and  all  insight  reasonable  ! 

Yet  are  we  men ;  or  true  or  false,  half-gods 

In  truth-assurance  !   And  as  man-god  I  find 

Mine  ignorance  self-sibylline,  self-taught ; 

With,  in  a  sort,  some  sure  authority 

Where  reason  fails.  Some  tongue  divine  there  is 

(Apollon,  Zeus,  Athena,  what  care  I  ?) 

That  leadeth  in  this  dialogue,  outweighs 

The  skeptic  inference  of  nescience 

And  asks  reconstitution  from  the  first 

Of  logic-method  and  false-premising. 

For  of  the  reason  reason's  way  hath  proved 

Equivocacy  —  by  what  analogue, 


SOCRATES 

What  test  demonstrable,  unequivocal 
(Apart  from  reason  !),  were  the  reason  all  ? 
And  thus,  at  first  thought,  must  the  reason-way 
Be  self-annihilating,  worse  than  void 
Because  delusively  aspiring  to 
Authoritatively  deny  itself  — 
Bewilderment,  to  reason  contrary ! 
But  the  god-man  in  us  will  never  yield 
The  right  to  question  and  determine  for  us 
Immediate  false-and-true,  even  if  beyond 
Each  tentative  decision  opens  wide 
New  vista  of  truth-possibility 
Which  relegates  as  unbelieved  untruth 
The  narrower  first  conclusion.   Still  the  process 
Of  searching  constitutes  authority ; 
The  purpose  must  assume  to  guide  the  mind 
With  motive  final,  though  each  stage  by  stage 
Within  the  dialectic  alter  yet 
All  minute  definition  of  our  aim 
With  shift  of  standpoint  —  as  my  pacing  feet 
Here  in  my  courtyard  change  the  shifting  sight 
Through  door  and  portico  of  shuffling  crowds ; 
Yet  ever  bear  me  back  and  forth  within 
The  parallels  of  some  soul-perfecting 
49 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Itself  as  felt  self-fix'd,  unalterable, 
And  lending  logic  to  the  swarming  scene 
Else  without  purport,  aimless  soullessly. 
Therefore  a  new  conception  of  the  soul 
Springs  of  itself  :  a  self-authority 
Within  the  reason,  self-condemnatory 
Indeed  (if  those  old  premises,  proved  false, 
Were  still  maintain'd  as  standpoint  of  debate), 
But  by  the  inward  dialogue  self-proved 
Final,  demonic,  in  best  sense  divine. 
For  see,  friend  (may  I  call  my  scholar-self, 
That  leads  me  whilst  he  seems  to  follow  still, 
Friend  whilst  the  talk  flows  on  and  knowledge  comes 
With  personal  sympathy  in  this  self-soul  ?), 
For  see  how  every  man  within  himself 
Stands  —  not  a  mere  untried  equivocal 
Opinion  isolate  from  aught  of  truth, 
Else  in  the  flux  of  a  void  of  skepticism ; 
But  —  each  within  himself  as  dialogue, 
Protagonist  and  chorus  of  the  truth, 
Himself  the  truth,  himself  the  tragedy 
That  finds  full  definition  but  in  death 
Of  one,  in  sympathetic  passing  o'er 
To  new  scenes  through  the  theatre  of  the  world  — 
50 


SOCRATES 

New  selfhood  —  of  the  many  to  spread  truth 
Fresh-learn 'd  by  witness  of  lost  falsity  : 
The  tragic  meaning !   See  how  every  growth 
Proves  but  self -definition  (in  itself, 
The  continuity  each  concept  lacks 
Beyond  the  moment's  premising),  soe'er 
Corrected,  still  identical  as  no 
Twice-held  opinion  !   Therefore  growth  itself, 
By  virtue  of  conclusive  questioning, 
Proved  the  all-saving  truth  ! 

'T  is  thus  I  learn 

Self-taught  to  solve  the  dim  antinomy 
As  never  in  mere  dialogue  with  men 
Might  the  truth  give  and  take  to  true  effect. 
For  see  how  closer  to  the  truth  I  stand 
Who  talk  within  me,  who  in  hearkening 
And  counter-talk  take  instant  sympathy 
(That  exercise  of  very  voice  divine) 
Which  no  man  with  his  neighbor  feeleth  so 
Whole  and  all-grasping  as  when  soul  with  self 
Commune  and  mutually  win  the  way 
Of  comprehension  !   Thus  by  this  communing 
I  feel  the  demon  for  the  truth's  own  fact ; 
My  inward  sight  (conclusive  of  the  views 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Of  both  inquirers,  by  hypothesis), 

The  perfect  sanction  and  authority  — 

And  need  none  other :  proving  reason  nought 

Of  mere  opinion  solely,  but  itself 

The  process  of  opinion-alterance, 

The  growth  intelligent  within  the  soul 

(True  in  degree  as  sympathy  inheres 

Instead  of  isolation,  comprehension 

In  place  of  demarcation  —  as  in  me  now  !), 

That  meets  and  talks  with  men  and  meets  their 

views 

With  counterview  born  of  the  gendering 
Of  soul  in  soul,  the  insight  sibylline.  — 
Why  forth  into  the  agora,  when  truth 
Comes  final  and  insistive  thus  within  ? 
Why  forth  to  processes  of  reasoning 
Imperfect,  self -destructive ;  when  the  way 
Of  reason,  method,  logic  I  have  learn 'd 
Alone  within  my  house  apart  from  men  ? 
But  might  I  not  in  converse  yet  explain  them 
The  loftier  definition  and  so  serve 
The  cause  of  clear  conception  in  the  mind 
By  leading  men  each  to  commune  alone 
With  self  and  so  experience  in  self 
52 


SOCRATES 

(Not  then  ascribable  to  other  minds 

Nor  any  mere  opinion  here  or  there) 

The  truth-assurance,  hear  the  voice  divine  ? 

For  thus  were  I  conclusive  of  mankind, 

The  continuity  of  other  men, 

Their  growth,  their  self-persuasion,  guarantee 

And  warrant  of  authority  as  truth ; 

Outward,  as  inwardly,  that  very  voice  ! 


53 


SOPHOCLES 

NOTHING  too  much  !  —  My  prosperous  old-age 
Were  proof  sufficient  of  the  paradigm. 
Nothing  too  much  :  gnomic  of  my  career !  — 
Aischylos'  wrath,  Euripides'  unrest 
(Each  rival,  he  the  loftier,  earlier  one 
Or  he  the  versatile  of  nowadays), 
At  odds  with  fortune  ;  ay,  whilst  I  work  on, 
At  harmony  with  all  things,  heartily, 
Happily  moulding  beauty  of  this  breath 
Of  times  antique,  to-day's,  to-morrow's  truth 
Alike,  in  terms  and  tones  accepted  yet 
Of  the  old,  old  stories,  tales  heroical 
Dear  to  the  Attic  heart  as  to  mine  own. 
Aischylos  knew  the  old  nobility 
Indeed,  and  worthily  did  mouth  of  it 
A  scene  high-sounding ;  but  himself  was  moved 
Too  deeply  as  by  horror,  felt  of  truth 
Some  secret  shame  and  somewhat  blamed  in  men 
Their  subtlest  reverence,  best  piety 
Of  faith,  their  fair  assumption  that  the  gods 
Are  from  reproach  immune ;  himself  thereby  — 
Through  effort  clearly  to  establish  Zeus 
54 


SOPHOCLES 

Above  mere  blame,  habilitate  the  truth  — 
Betray 'd  into  impiety  perchance 
By  strange  portrayal  of  a  Zeus  impure 
Self -justified  in  tyranny.   Howbeit, 
Was  Aischylos  at  odds  with  Attic  taste, 
Safest  criterion  of  sanity  ; 
Taste  which  demandeth  no  self-justifier 
For  Zeus  Olympian,  but  sees  in  him 
Embodiment  of  sanction ;  all  his  deeds 
Themselves  criterial  of  justice.   So 
Was  Aischylos  at  odds  with  earth  and  found 
Too  much  of  meaning  in  the  mighty  myth 
For  man  to  master  and  make  art  of  it. 
And  thus,  forsooth,  he  fail'd.   Euripides 
Is  of  another  mould,  but  no  less  fails. 
For  him,  the  too-much  lieth  in  a  zeal 
To  reconstruct,  make  something  new  of  truth, 
Plainly  half-impious  in  denying  much 
Men  must  believe,  be  there  but  gods  at  all ; 
A  zeal  too  much  to  substitute  for  myth 
The  lore  of  merely  men,  to  feel  and  speak 
Men  as  they  are,  though  unheroical 
And  far  too  homely  for  our  tragedy. 
His  ways  betray  their  failure,  that  they  feel 
55 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Scarce  horror,  scarce  a  shame,  but  sympathy 

For  failure.   E'en,  his  plays  would  seem  to  teach 

Not  reverence  for  godhood  nor  for  men 

Moderate  and  potent,  but  for  men  (unlike, 

Far  too  unlike  mine  own  prosperity 

And  harmony  of  competence  !)  themselves 

Similar  in  their  unprosperity 

To  him  who  made  them  not  as  heroes  are. 

'T  is  thus  with  Aischylos,  Euripides, 

And  all  who  yield  too  much  unto  themselves. 

Unmoved  I  make  men  as  they  ought  to  be  — 

Men  failing  alone  by  Fate,  if  fail  they  must 

(Crush'd  nor  as  by  tyranny  divine  nor  lost 

Of  any  seed  of  weakness  in  themselves) ; 

Heroic,  high :  and  in  myself  reflect 

Lustre  of  ancient  mythus  all  my  days. 

Such  as  the  marble  works  of  Perikles 

Or  perfect  Pheidias  is  mine  old-age, 

Serene,  unmoved,  at  harmony  with  all 

Of  good  or  ill,  one  with  our  Attic  taste, 

Calm  in  Kolonos  though  the  Long  Walls  fall, 

Which  fate  forefend  unto  our  piety  !  — 

Nothing  too  much.  —  And  am  I  calm  at  heart 

56 


SOPHOCLES 

Whilst  tottereth  Athenai,  and  the  men 
Who  made  her  glorious  die  day  by  day 
Before  me,  and  the  years  of  them  are  o'er 
Who  should  have  been  eternal ;  when  the  times 
(Even  in  this  interval  of  Spartan  peace) 
Not  as  by  Fate,  but  as  by  human  fault, 
Fall  from  their  leading  and  forget  their  name 
Who  bless'd  and  still  should  bless  with  memory 
The  place  that  once  possess'd  them  ?    Am  I  calm  ? 
Might  I  write,  all  unmoved,  of  such  as  them  ? 
Of  gods-made-men,  of  men  heroical 
Who  labored  and  achieved,  yet,  by  some  flaw 
Of  the  human  in  them,  suffer'd  and  are  lost  ? 
Were  not  the  tragedy  I  might  produce 
If  moved  by  sympathy  with  former  friends 
Something  superior  to  the  perfect  piece ; 
Something  which  Aischylos,  Euripides, 
Each  may  have  sought  if  blindly,  may  have  said 
Somewhat  though  I  have  miss'd  ?  This  Aischylos, 
Portray'd  he  not  Zeus  reconciled  with  men 
By  understanding  face  to  face,  by  speech, 
More  potent  even  than  a  Fate  unnamed  ? 
This  fervent,  multiple  Euripides, 
Sings  he  not  somewhat  as  of  man  who  works 
57 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

And  partially  prevails  ?   Did  Perikles 
Perfect  yon  Propylaia,  yet  and  fell 
(Ah  !  like  these  human  of  Euripides !) 
Grief-stricken  for  a  pestilence,  dismay'd — 
Not  as  by  Fate,  but  for  our  human  fault  — 
At  the  times'  prospect  ?   Did  not  Pheidias 
(If  not  for  tyranny,  yet  as  for  godhood, 
Ah  !  Zeus-apologist  of  Aischylos  !) 
Suffer  dishonor  from  Athena's  folk  ? 
I  have  seen  Perikles  dismay'd  in  death 
And  Pheidias  dishonor'd  :  but  myself 
(Nay,  note  the  irony  :  myself  the  Fate !) 
Have  never  known  a  failure,  not  till  now  ! 
Scarce  or  in  soul  or  skena  have  I  fail'd  — 
Till  now  by  sympathy  ?   Though  all  men  else, 
The  princely  Perikles  or  Pheidias 
My  perfect  peer  alike  (ah,  irony !), 
Attempt  some  way  too  much,  are  broken  by  it 
I  nowise  !   Were  my  way  indeed  the  best  ? 
Or  faileth  not  the  gnoma  where  I  fail 
By  sympathy  unwonted,  proving  so  much 
Of  meaning  to  our  life  that  none  should  be 
Of  golden  mediocrity  who  live  ? 
Was  not  I  dead  until  this  moment's  mood 
58 


SOPHOCLES 

Of  sympathy  too  much  revivifying 
For  calm  of  artistry  within  my  soul 
The  over-zeal,  the  over- weakness,  yet 
The  peerless  manhood  of  my  manhood's  friends, 
Perikles,  Pheidias  (e'en  Euripides?), 
Worthy  of  loftiest  poetry  and  pose 
Upon  our  skena  as  I  know  to-day  ? 
Combine  the  Zeus-defensive  with  the  man 
Weltering  in  self-felt  weakness  :  and  conceive 
The  archetype  of  more-than-tragedy, 
The  ultimatum  of  our  Attic  taste  !  — 
My  way  achieved  the  most :  so  men  must  say  — 
And  self-peace  with  the  accomplishment,  't  was  true 
Behold  my  three-score  tragedies,  supreme 
In  men's  opinion  over  all  plays  else, 
Perchance  ?   But  at  this  moment  all  are  nought, 
All,  to  begin  anew  still  unbegun, 
And  I  first  competent  by  this  too-much 
Which  now  hath  hold  on  me  and  shakes  my  soul 
With  wrath  and  unrest  for  the  failure  of 
Perfection,  for  the  perfecting  by  death 
(Or  failure's  self  ?)  of  work  still  useless  else, 
For  all  its  mere  achievement.   To  my  soul 
Or  unto  Attika,  alone  hath  worth 
59 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

The  wonder  of  men's  suffering,  the  gods' 
Self -justification  through  a  tyranny 
None  the  less  hateful  that  it  richeth  life 
To  beauty  by  the  very  pity  of  it ! 

'T  is  this  my  pity  for  that  Perikles, 
Mine  agony  for  Athenai,  that  is  more 
Than  any  self-success  :  't  is  that  alone 
Which  makes  of  tragedy  the  art  of  truth 
And  nature  above  nature  (life  of  mine, 
By  feeling  as  by  insight  life  of  theirs  ! ) ; 
Which  makes  me  great  as  Aischylos  was  great 
And  this  Euripides  beyond  us  both  : 
Me  great,  if  only  great  by  Oidipous 
The  Sufferer  who  serveth-Attika 
By  suffering  still  our  hospitality  ! 
Me,  moved  in  Kolonos  by  mine  Oidipous, 
Who  by  too  much  of  failure  proves  at  end 
A  best  possession  of  our  Attika, 
A  blessing  and  beneficence  of  Zeus 
Through  all  our  days,  maugre  the  curse  and  sin 
Of  human  ignorance  and  gods'  despite !  — 
Ah  !  if  through  failure  hitherto  by  too-much 
Of  artistry,  too-little  poethood 
60 


SOPHOCLES 

In  me  (too-much  perfecting ;  not  enough 
Creation  !),  yet  some  day  my  sweet  Kolonos 
May  feel  bless'd  in  possession  of  my  bones 
And  honor  me  with  sacrifice  perchance 
For  honoring  in  rhyme  this  Oidipous 
Most  pitiably  human  of  all  men 
Though  unheroical ;  may  honor  me 
For  the  true  poethood,  for  tragedy 
Above,  beyond  the  golden  media, 
Teeming  with  sympathies  as  now  my  soul 
(Not  as  by  Fate,  but  for  her  human  fault  — 
As  I,  being  I,  must  know  no  Fate  for  mine  !) 
Appropriates  failure  and  in  her  old-age 
Becomes  (as  Aischylos',  Euripides') 
Herself  of  tragic  meaning,  hence  of  man  : 
Achieving  more  than  some  prosperity 
Of  senile  competence  :  me,  Sophokles, 
Somewhat  as  Oidipous,  a  truth  at  last, 
Some  gnoma  in  my  person  and  a  force 
To  guide,  make  grow,  not  pander  Attic  taste  : 
Me,  moved  in  Kolonos  by  the  pity  of  it ! 


61 


PLATO 

THE  blue  sky  overarcheth  with  a  sense 
Of  space  illimitable,  self-sustain'd.  — 
The  blue  waves  fling  awide  in  the  breeze ;  sea-birds 
Wheel,  hover,  dart  in  the  foam  with  plunge  and  scream 
Unfetter'd ;  and  the  wings  of  this  swift  ship 
Aiginaward  from  Syrakousai  press 
Before  this  west  wind  as  with  inward  will 
And  purpose :  every  sight  and  sound  inform'd 
With  life-insistence.    Yet  of  me  my  mind 
Alone  is  free,  this  body  but  a  slave 
By  tyranny's  command  ;  and  in  a  slave 
Must  my  mind  evermore  be  buried  as 
In  some  self-sheol ;  taking  blow  by  blow 
The  temper  of  obedience,  the  tone 
Of  sequence  and  subservience ;  to  be 
As  shadow  only  of  the  mind  of  man, 
As  tyrant's  sycophant !   How  far  opposed 
Unto  my  present  temper  and  that  tone 
Of  proud  reliance  and  a  high  disdain 
Which  brought  my  downfall :  even  thus  my  mind 
Sold  into  slavery  as  some  prisoner 
By  power  of  circumstance  ;  that  circumstance 

62 


PLATO 

Its  bondage  to  the  body  !   For  all  things 

Are  sycophant,  subservient  sequently 

To  matter's  tyranny,  the  base  command 

Of  physical  passivity  ;  and  seem 

Free  but  by  mind's  illusion,  active  but 

By  figure  of  the  fancy.   Lo !  these  masts 

Are  bended  of  a  blast  inanimate 

And  would  not,  haply,  though  indeed  they  must 

Aiginaward  bear  on  ;  and  so  the  sea 

Bursts  beneath  burden  of  this  bustling  breeze ; 

The  birds  by  hard  desire  of  food  or  lust 

To  procreate  their  kind  are  driven  fro 

And  yon  pursuing  and  pursued,  not  one 

All  self-impulsive,  but  directed  all 

Toward  outward  circumstance  ;  the  sacred  sky 

Doubtless  were  but  some  element ;  as  these 

Compell'd  —  to  silence  and  a  stagnancy  ? 

Shall  I,  the  slave  of  Dionysios'  sneer, 

Decay  to  silence  and  a  stagnancy  ? 

The  mind  hath  seem'd  creator  of  all  things, 
Divine  by  emanation  of  all  truth 
Therefrom  —  impress'd  not  as  from  truth-without 
Nowise  subservient  (witness  Sokrates 

63 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Sublime  in  dying!).   Yet  this  slightest  change 

Of  the  body's  state  from  freeman  unto  slave, 

This  incident  of  Dionysios'  frown, 

Shall  this  corrupt  the  essence  of  Idea  ? 

(Was  Sokrates  to  such  a  death  compelled  ? ) 

How  slight  an  alteration  ;  when  from  birth 

Hath  body,  like  the  billows  or  these  birds, 

Been  driven  —  whether  as  by  outer  force 

Or  inward  want,  what  heed  ?  —  through  all  its  days 

A  creature  of  necessity  compell'd  : 

And  therewith  even  the  Reason  housed  therein. 

How  slight  a  change,  how  insignificant, 

From  free  to  slave,  if  body  aye  be  slave  ! 

Have  I,  one  hour,  been  freeman  and  not  slave  ? 

Is  any  man  then  free  ?    Freeman  or  slave, 

Can  slavery  alter  then  one  whit  the  state 

Of  Reason  (bar  that  truth  of  Sokrates 

The  Savior)?    For  if  man  is  never  free, 

Then  slavery,  being  best  knowledge  of  himself, 

But  aids  toward  freedom.   And,  if  not  slave-born 

In  virtue  of  our  body-prisonment, 

Then  Reason  lifts  beyond  all  circumstance 

Compulsive,  whether  sold  a  slave  or  no. 

(And  either  way  is  Sokrates  proved  free 


PLATO 

As  he  devoted  body  unto  death  ! 
And  either  way  is  custody  of  body  — 
'Soe'er  custodian  of  soul  —  no  curse ! )  — 
I  have  been  somewhat  free  beyond  most  men, 
Somewhat  more  reasoning  and  therefore  moved 
Of  high  philosophy  to  seek  abroad 
The  springs  of  wisdom  in  the  ways  of  men. 
By  Neilos,  in  Kyrene  have  I  sought ; 
Elea ;  and  schools  of  the  Pythagoreans ; 
Completing  the  best  circuit  of  men's  dreams 
To  blend  in  them  I  had  at  Megara 
With  keen  Eukleides  since  Athenai-time. 
Might  I  return,  within  as  outward  wise 
A  bondman  ?     Or  shall  this  last  voyaging 
Aiginaward  achieve  what  I  have  sought : 
An  insight  and  a  system  of  the  truth  ? 

Behold  !  from  those  sweet  lips  of  Sokrates 
I  first  received  the  love  of  lofty  thought  — 
Him,  who  in  all  mine  earnest  dialogues 
Enacts  protagonist  'mid  many  men  ; 
Him,  symbol  of  all  rationality  ! 
To  him  be  mine  obeisance  !   Though  the  soul 
Seek  sight  original,  his  sight  leads  on  ! 

65 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

For  from  his  doctrine  thus  much  I  imbibed  : 
The  primacy  of  Reason ;  how  no  truth 
Is  truth  but  by  the  mind's  conception  of  it, 
By  definition  common  to  its  class 
And  therefore  self -sufficed,  immutable, 
Free  and  eternal,  not  as  one  of  these. 
His  the  new  gnoma :  '  Learn  of  soul,  not  world ' 
Despite  the  physicists.   From  him  the  faith : 
Of  freedom  in  the  realm  of  pure  Idea. 
And  yet,  these  elder  Eleatic  schools 
Who  look  for  freedom  in  some  Unity 
And  find  in  Wholeness  physical  their  Law  ! 
Or  they  who,  Herakleitos-like,  have  found 
Sanction  and  satisfaction  in  the  theme 
Of  flux  and  passing  on  the  face  of  things  ! 
Found  they  not  somewhat  meet  unto  the  mind, 
Somewhat  of  permanence,  self-equity, 
In  outward  world  despite  the  paradox  ? 
Methinks  Pythagoras  might  yield  a  term, 
Some  golden  mean  between  the  face  of  things 
That  passeth  and  the  'stablishment  of  Law  ? 
Number  hath  multiplicity  and  still 
Permanence,  unity  of  character, 
A  certain  continence  of  identity, 

66 


PLATO 

Through  all  mutation.   With  that  thought  to  guide, 

Might  not  a  way  be  found  to  reconcile 

The  freedom  and  the  slavery  of  man  ? 

For  in  the  man,  as  in  the  number-scheme, 

Are  integrality  (the  freedom  of  him, 

Well-named  the  mind  —  the  pride  of  Sokrates 

Unswervable)  and  multiplicity, 

This  sequent  reference  to  other  things 

(That  hemlock  offer 'd  to  the  lips  to  drink !). 

In  man  are  sameness,  then,  and  otherness 

Strangely  united  —  as,  eclectical, 

I  seek  thus  to  unite  Parmenides 

With  him  of  Ephesos  through  terms  of  speech 

Best  writ  in  the  book  I  bought  (but  now  have  lost) 

Of  Philolaos.     Can  the  problem  be 

So  simple  of  solution  :  that  some  Soul 

Inheres  between  the  heavens  and  the  earth, 

'Twixt  mind  and  body  reconciling  them, 

Partaking  of  them  both,  yet  nowise  they; 

Whose  omnipresence  and  omnipotence 

Is  mathematic,  Number's  very  self  ? 

A  mighty  bolt  to  unbar  heaven  and  earth, 
Forsooth  ;  a  business  now  beyond  my  brain 
67 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Perturb'd  by  sense  of  slavehood's  impotency, 
But  mightily  alluring  should  some  chance 
Exchange  this  serfdom  for  the  nobler  life 
Of  citizen  and  teacher  in  some  court 
Or  garden  near  to  Akademos'  grove. 
Ah,  might  I  hope  some  outlook  to  return 
Homeward  redeem 'd  by  bounty  of  a  friend  ! 
More  like,  to  execution  am  I  haled 
(A  parody  of  Sokrates  indeed  ! ) 
Among  the  Aiginetans  hostile  to  me 
By  reason  of  their  quarrel  with  our  State ! 
Ah,  me  !   And  yet  some  insight  have  I  gain'd 
Haply  of  moment  equal  unto  all 
That  learning  of  the  Schools  :  this  sense  that  man 
Is  still  both  slave  and  free,  and  that  in  world 
(The  type  of  serfdom)  as  in  very  mind 
(Our  type  of  freedom)  equally  inheres 
The  dualism  and  blendeth  with  them  both  : 
The  mind,  by  reason  of  its  bodiment, 
Imbued  with  strange  compulsion  ;  and  the  world, 
By  reason  of  the  primacy  of  mind, 
Passive  beneath  some  freedom-of-its-own 
Inseparable,  nowise  not  of  it. 
And  thus  is  Soul  the  very  problem's  self, 
68 


PLATO 

•. 
The  mean  and  common  term  contained  of  both 

(Though  both  have  nought  in  common,  nought  be 
tween  ! ) 

Matter  and  spirit,  containing  equally 
Both  horns  of  world's  dilemma  :  and  thus  a  term 
Not  separable  nor  abstracted  from 
The  conflict  which  defines  it  (Sokrates 
Involved  in  birth-and-dying ;  life  and  death 
Explain'd  through  Sokrates  !).  —  And  thus  were  they 
Right,  the  old  physiographers,  to  test 
The  world  all  ways,  that  it  might  yield  its  truth 
E'en  though  material ;  for  in  the  earth 
Its  constitution  see  we  mirror- wise 
The  problem  of  the  heavens,  the  elements 
Which  are  contain 'd  of  mind  inversely  shown 
(Flux,  change  for  self ;  peace  for  the  space  of  things) 
To  mind's  interpretation.   As  was  he 
Right,  the  great  Sokrates,  to  prove  of  mind 
The  truth  direct :  the  peace  of  inward  self, 
The  roil  but  own'd  of  otherness  perceived 
By  sense  without.   Wherefore  am  I  not  wrong 
To  seek  in  soul  of  the  world  some  scheme  that  shall 
(As  air  is  intermediate,  proportion'd 
Harmonic  'twixt  the  heavens  and  the  earth) 

69 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Explain  the  contrast ;  show  how  man  is  free 
(How  Sokrates  both  lived  and  died,  one  Man) 
Though  slave,  how  serfdom  never  may  express 
The  psychic  habitancy  of  the  spheres 
As  my  soul  soars  and  is  at  peace  with  them 
Through  all  this  turmoil's  sad  expectancy ! 

For,  lo !  how  were  a  freedom  to  be  found 
In  isolation,  void  of  other  men 
To  meet  in  equal  intercourse  of  mind 
With  mind,  each  mind  thus  entering  in  and 

owning 

As  self-like  every  fresh  mentality 
Not  as  identical  conceived,  but  known 
As  other,  mutually  known,  defined  ? 
The  way  of  loneliness  were  ever  silence 
And  stagnancy,  not  self-sufficiency 
To  any  purpose  :  serfdom,  but  world's  type 
Inverted  of  such  isolation ;  I 
Fitly  enslaved  for  seeking  such  a  scheme 
Of  vacant  chaos  as  were  mere  Idea 
Hypostatized  but  not  phenomenal, 
Identical  but  wholly  undefined  — 
Interminable  !  How  were  World-Ideas 
70 


PLATO 

Aught  wonderful  or  worthy,  were  not  each 

Defined,  scarce  by  some  common  character 

In  concept  (quite  precluded  to  the  lone 

Idea!)  but,  best,  beyond  identity, 

By  contrast  self-implied  through  all  the  world  ? 

For  otherwise  were  they  but  number  merely ; 

As  world,  indifferently  were  one  or  nought ; 

Subject  to  duplication,  hence  unreal, 

Because  still  undefined,  positionless : 

But  now  are  Number  reconciling  all 

Perplexity  by  implication  each 

Of  unity  in  multiplicity, 

Of  integrality  in  otherness ; 

And  world  is  not  without,  but  is  of  mind. — 

Yon  blue  waves  beat  and  burst  because  they  must ; 

These  masts  bend,  driven,  to  the  piping  gale 

And  part  the  waters  with  a  roar  and  rush 

Of  proud  prow-impulse ;  and  the  white  sea-birds 

Pursue  and  are  pursued.   But  all  because 

Yon  blue  sky  soars  not  self-illimitable 

(Is  not  some  element  apart  from  these): 

Serene  indeed,  but  standing  upon  earth 

Or  ocean's  wide-encircled  founding-flood 

A  thing  of  breath  and  air,  of  motion,  spirit  — 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

Itself  a  spirit  as  all  space  is  spirit 

Containing  and  contained  ;  not  calculable, 

But  valued  as  of  truth :  and  is  as  they. 

I  am  a  slave  and  enter  into  freedom 

By  bondage  —  a  slave  —  and  have  achieved  a  Soul ! 


72 


ARISTOTLE 

HOW  can  he  teach  who  faileth  to  explain 
The  method  of  our  learning,  how  we  come 
To  know  the  unknown  :  an  we  truly  learn  ? 
How  can  he  teach  who  cannot  of  himself 
Find  organon,  who  groping  for  the  Mind 
Loseth  all  grasp  of  soul's  experience  ? 
How  can  he  yield  experience  to  men  ? 

Not  recollection  nor  forgetfulness 
Might  solve  this  paradox  of  Known-Unknown, 
This  presence  of  an  universal  truth 
In  truth  not  universal,  of  the  God 
In  self,  the  certainty  in  sensuous  things 
As  felt  despite  their  doubt  and  falsity : 
This  difficulty  of  the  Master's  creed 
Which  he  might  name  but  never  might  remove 
By  myth  —  metempsychosis  and  the  dream 
Of  anamnesis,  fable  which  assumes 
Original  possession,  someway  lost, 
Of  truth  whose  gradual  acquirement, 
Of  godship  whose  contingent  genesis 
(Alone  the  problem  as  the  paradox !) 
73 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Alone  might  be  demonstrable.    For  what  proof 
(E'en  were  the  proof  to  problem  pertinent!) 
Were  plausible  ?  Where  might  the  man  begin 
His  immemoriality  save  as 
(God  being  alone  possess'd  of  truth  as  whole) 
The  very  Godhead  ?  And,  if  very  God, 
Then  must  each  consequent  remove  by  birth 
(Each  strange  escape  of  warrant  ultimate 
From  out  the  actual  which  alone  Is  !) 
Be  some  degeneration,  without  cause 
Or  logic  possible,  compatible ; 
A  flaw  in  the  fibre  of  the  Essence'  Self, 
A  foul  decomposition  as  of  death 
(A  name,  this  death,  perchance,  for  all  this  coil  ?) 
Inherent,  not  to  any  mortal  thing 
But,  to  the  causal  Origin  of  Life ! 
And  thus  of  one  hand  must  the  Godhead  prove 
Self-contradiction,  incompatible 
With  absolute  establishment ;  whilst  yet 
Of  the  other  hand  the  life  of  every  man, 
Increasing  hourly  by  experience 
In  knowledge  and  in  wisdom,  contradicts 
The  tendence  of  the  Godhead  (thus  defined 
As  stultification),  and  moreover  thwarts 
74 


ARISTOTLE 

By  mere  inevitable  cumulance 

Of  certainty  and  insight  through  the  years 

The  natural  teleology  of  things ; 

Runs  counter  to  the  soul's  supremest  goal 

Of  perfect  godship  as  the  crown  of  life 

(For  so  this  Platen's  doctrine  needs  were  crown'd) 

Such  godship  (that  of  self-degenerance 

Inherent)  shown  beneath  the  dignity 

Of  idiocy,  a  godship  self-deceived 

And  worse  than  worthless  if  deceiving  Man  ! 

The  Master  endeth  in  a  Mystery : 

An  universe  at  odds  within  itself ; 

A  primal  Cause  of  self-deintegrance  — 

And  he,  by  preassumed  self-ignorance,  shown 

Unfit  to  teach  who  knoweth  not  to  learn  !  — 

I  well  know  otherwise  ;  I  feel  in  me 

A  worth  of  wisdom  in  experience, 

The  value  of  this  sense-accumulation, 

The  dignity  of  life  as  it  is  learning 

And  not  forgetfulness,  the  insight  gather'd 

Aspiring  as  to  God  ;  and  know  the  God 

A  goal  of  aspiration  ;  if  unmoved 

(Still  unattainable),  yet  not  at  last 

Devolving  and  destroying,  save  as  death 

75 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Be  parcel  of  developmental  life, 

Wherethrough  the  individual  achieves 

An  impulse  for  the  race  and  class  of  each 

Onward  and  Godward !  —  How  shall  these  truths  be  ? 

A  motion  and  a  Cause ;  the  creature  moved 
And  the  Creator  —  if  the  phrase  be  so. 
An  immanence  of  universalness 
Conative,  self-recognizant  in  act, 
A  system  of  accumulance  impress'd 
As  in  a  mould ;  a  force  defining  self 
Substantial  wise ;  a  matter  and  a  form. 
These,  the  essentials ;  and  the  rest  obtains. 
I  touch  and  test  the  world  of  men  and  things, 
Finding  one  substance  to  the  touch  and  test, 
An  opposition,  self-negation  of 
All  impulse,  a  passivity  excluding 
(Particularity  of  judgment-mode) 
Its  own  mere  part-displacement  under  stress, 
A  space-impassive  none  the  less  compell'd  : 
For  creature-moment ;  and  I  call  the  thing 
Matter,  as  meaning  elemental  rest, 
The  moved  and  dead-created,  uncreate, 
Immobile  in  itself  — nay,  that  which  hath 
76 


ARISTOTLE 

As  't  were  no  selfhood,  is  not  in  itself. 
I  touch  and  test  the  world  of  self  within, 
Finding  a  test,  but  not  a  substance  here 
To  touch :  an  action  of  appropriance 
(The  generality  of  truth-adjudged), 
Hardly  of  opposition  though  containing 
All  self-distinction,  part  within  the  part. 
This  that  I  find  I  call  the  mind  of  me 
(Experiential ;  never  as  in  dream 
Disjunct  from  world,  self-segregate  from  things ; 
But  registrant  and  nowise  self-innate) ; 
Made  universal  as  the  world  of  mind, 
The  self-impressive,  that  which  makes  the  test 
As  register'd  and  testing  registrates ; 
Which  is  creator  of  distinctiveness 
As  though  internal  through  the  vague  extern 
Of  segregative  substance,  binding  it 
To  self-relationship  and  unity ; 
And  thus  is  mould,  or  still  more  subtly  Form, 
The  final  motive.   Thus  the  riddle  reads. 
Now,  to  the  theme  of  world-development 
(Consonant  with  the  growth  of  me  by  thought 
Or  act-participation  in  affairs 
From  day  to  day)  must  a  new  proof  adhere 
77 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Of  tendency,  self-teleology 
In  mutualization  of  the  duplex  stuffs 
(Abstractly  so  defined  as  I  've  defined  them 
Each  aspect  severally);  for  these  must  still 
Constitute  interplay ;  and  otherwise 
Were  no  duplexity  but  separate  worlds 
Unthinkable,  preposterous  to  proof. 
Therefore  must  be  for  further  postulate 
The  innate  yearning  of  the  primal  vague 
Toward  truth-distinctiveness  as  in  a  sort 
Appropriate  thereto,  a  property 
(Degenerative  of  degenerance'  self, 
Preclusive  of  inertia  in  the  inert ! ) 
Even  of  passivity  as  actualized  ; 
And  on  the  counter  hand  the  zeal  of  mind 
To  transcend  and  sublate  with  proof  of  form 
(And  thus  achieve  itself  !)  material  fact : 
The  term  of  mind  actualized  so  and  taken 
For  mutual-matter's  goal-finality. 
Likewise  the  inward  latency  of  things 
Toward  declaration — not  as  though  some  void 
Were  gradual  filPd  of  substance  less  or  more 
Compact-diffuse ;  but  as  though  form  and  substance 
Were  self-processive,  were  by  nature  nought 
78 


ARISTOTLE 

Than  mutuality,  whose  proof  and  sign 
Is  Time,  the  passing  of  the  days  and  years. 
Nor  might  a  logic  of  analysis 
(Such  as  were  practical  to  be  put  forth, 
On  basis  of  the  Platonism  here, 
To  counteract  the  Master's  mere  mistakes 
Of  extra-worldliness,  and  yet  to  be 
Readily  understanded  of  the  schools), 
A  classification  of  our  genera 
And  species,  an  epistemology 
Of  type  as  perfect  object  (as  I  fear 
My  doctrine  will  adumbrate,  implicate 
As  men  will  half-mistake  it ! )  quite  attain 
A  method-organon  of  such  a  scheme 
Of  cumulance  and  temporality, 
In  mutualizing  of  each  element 
By  definition  through  all  substance  else. 
Substance  unmutual  were  stuff  of  space, 
'Tis  true,  demarcable  and  alterable 
Partitive-wise,  abstract  each  part  from  part 
And  strictly  self-contain'd  in  every  part 
Without  a  reference  to  aught  extern  — 
Such  stuff  were  well  demonstrable  by  rule 
Of  contradiction  and  a  common  term 
79 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

For  consubstantiation ;  and  indeed 
Were  such  a  logic-system  Platon's  surely, 
Conformable  to  and  explicable  of 
The  pure  Idea.   But  such  should  not  be  my 
Doctrine  of  knowledge ;  for  my  creed  should  be 
More  adequate  to  a  knowledge  entering  in 
As  mind-term  of  the  world-hypothesis 
Developmental,  cumulant  —  whereof, 
Despite  all  ignorance,  might  no  term  be 
Itself  unknown  in  present  actualness  ; 
Such  membership  in  knowledge  rightly  achieved, 
Not  by  community  with  outer  fact 
(Mergence  impossible)  but,  by  reference 
To  somewhat  (selfhood  with  the  object  of  it) 
Both  gone  before  and  coming  after ;  each  term 
Itself  present  in  time  but  nowise  one 
With  what  it  cannot  be,  the  yesterday 
Nor  the  to-morrow ;  but  each  day  of  days 
Defining  and  referring  in  itself 
To  all-time  ;  thus  eternal ;  thus  self-known 
By  self-distinctiveness ;  thus  generalized, 
Self -absolute  as  every  Truth  must  be  ! 
And  thus  alone  were  knowledge  possible 
As  universal  in  the  temporal  scheme  ; 
80 


ARISTOTLE 

And  thus  alone  were  logic  actual 
Because  contain 'd  of  cumulative  life 
Processive,  self-achieving  as  toward  God  ! 

'T  were  plausible!   And  note  how  opens  out 
The  field  of  travail  to  philosophy : 
No  longer  blind  to  every  fact  of  earth 
With  faith  but  focuss'd  on  the  farthest  stars, 
But  finding  in  the  daily  strife  o'  the  world 
The  dear  domain  of  absolute  idea, 
Of  form  the  truth-constructor,  not  beyond 
World  wholly  (for,  were  form  beyond  the  world, 
Were  form  but  shown  inane  and  actionless 
In  isolation  of  a  pseudo-truth 
Call'd  mathematic,  number)  but,  itself 
The  mind,  self-comprehension  of  things  all. 
So,  to  the  field  of  travail !  that  this  earth 
Be  catalogued ;  and  categorical 
Analysis  —  not  sheerly  part  from  part, 
But  mutualwise  with  generality 
Specifical  in  contrast  self -contain 'd 
Of  each  itself  —  declare  of  each  the  frame 
And  genesis,  its  coming  unto  truth. — 
Granted  that  all  shall  pass  and  grow  anew 
81 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

To  stricter  frame,  more  self-disposed  to  achieve 
Economy  of  action  purposeful ; 
Granted  that  teleology  propose 
Invention  now  undream 'd  :  and  therefore  these 
Now  extant  modern  instances  of  truth 
Wax  obsolete :  shall  that  deter  one  whit 
The  wonder  of  the  instant  truth-survey, 
The  sure  investigation  here  and  now 
Whereof  each  item  of  real  genesis 
(Nowise  explaining  away  the  now-complex  !) 
Shall  postulate  and  indicate  to  men 
The  doctrine  of  the  vital  latency, 
The  potency  of  matter  and  the  zeal 
Energic  of  the  world-updrawing  mind 
Godward  developing  through  all  her  days  ? 
The  cause  efficient  as  the  genesis  : 
And  then  beyond,  beneath  and  still  within, 
The  God-cause  final,  the  perfected  Form 
So  far  as  may  be  meant  of  mortal  mind 
Working  within  these  days  and  in  these  ways 
That  man  may  work  in  as  the  world  is  young. 
And,  young  or  old,  some  knowledge  step  by  step 
Sure  in  the  doctrine  and  the  world-idea, 
The  formative  pure  process  and  the  proof 
82 


ARISTOTLE 

By  teleology,  the  yearning-toward 
Inherent  and  insistent !  —  At  the  worst 
'T  were  plausible,  though  still  the  rift  remain 
And  riddle  of  an  universe  at  odds ! 
Though  still  the  self-dilemma  needs  inhere  : 
Of  Learning  in  the  stead  of  Ready-Known, 
Of  genesis  in  place  of  plethora  ! 
Though  all  be  problem  still,  't  were  plausible  ! 
Why  trouble,  then,  further  with  the  riddle  of  it, 
When  at  the  worst  my  world  is  onwardly 
A  self-correction,  not  a  chaos-come  ? 
My  logic  stands  sufficient  to  the  times, 
Their  need  to  dis-god  Platon  and  design 
An  organon  of  high  acquirement 
By  truth  transmissible,  so  teachable, 
Not  block'd  by  body's  bad  forgetfulness, 
But  plain  appreciable  as  here  and  now 
Complete,  didactically  fmitive : 
Wanting  but  souls  to  seize  it !  Oh,  for  some 
King-born  disciple,  one  who  might,  by  strength 
Of  this  world-knowledge,  as  he  conquer 'd  earth, 
Rule  well,  self-cognizant  of  law  and  rule 
Within  him  as  within  the  world  he  ruled  ; 
Some  pliant  prince,  receptive  to  the  mould 
83 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

(Philippos'  child,  the  Makedonian's, 
My  father's  patron's  grandson,  should  be  he  ?) 
Of  this  my  masterful  impressive  mind 
As  matter  to  the  Form  —  I  unto  him 
Master  and  God-cause  final ;  he  to  me 
The  latency,  the  striving.    That  my  labor 
Be  not  lost,  but  my  name  be  known  in  him 
(No  name  of  race  nor  class  nor  kind,  but  my  name  !), 
An  universe  of  practice,  though  my  theme 
Be  theoretic  and  my  deeds  be  nought.  — 
The  Master  of  these  Akademos-groves 
Hath  miss'd  the  meaning,  is  as  one  apart, 
For  all  his  vast  discipleship  here  shown. 
He  is  a  truth,  but  weak  within  the  world 
Because  of  isolation,  disregard 
Of  the  body  of  the  world,  its  genuine  zeal 
Toward  self-salvation  and  accumulance 
Of  truth  experiential  in  the  form 
Impressible  by  men  'mongst  other  men, 
By  mind  'mongst  other  minds  projectible 
Each  upon  others  pedagogically  — 
And  by  such  only.    For  were  truth  apart, 
A  theme  but  of  these  Akademic  groves, 
Then  were  no  knowledge  possible,  unless 
84 


ARISTOTLE 

We  dream 'd  and  have  forgotten  and  at  best 
May  bitterly  remember  as  we  die 
The  old  lost  Godhood  self-deintegrant. 
But  I,  I  grow  by  inward  genesis 
Of  truth  in  every  instant ;  and  start  forth 
A  Teacher ;  and  shall  teach  unto  some  man 
(Whether  or  no  Demosthenes  denounce  !) 
The  secret  of  the  governance  of  earth  : 
And,  unto  ages,  truth  grown  of  my  truth  ! 


ASOKA 

BEHOLD  these  my  decrees,  on  steles  set 
Plain,  in  the  portions  of  mine  empire 
Triune,  in  North  and  East  and  West  alike 
Proclaiming  dominance  of  my  true  creed, 
The  cult  of  Him  the  Buddha,  Blessed  One  !  - 
How  hold  my  diverse  empire  in  hand 
As  wholly  mine  and  mighty,  save  by  such 
Dominance  of  some  spiritual  truth 
Potent  to  seize  upon  men's  many  minds 
And  so  subdue  them  to  subservience, 
Leaving  my  mind  lifted  on  high  alone 
Above  their  poor  desires  and  feebler  will ; 
My  will  and  my  desire  alone  of  strength 
To  overcome  sedition,  stamp  all  sign 
Of  treason  from  beneath  me,  and  be  sure  : 
Asoka,  I,  supreme,  imperial  ? 

Asoka,  I,  supreme,  imperial, 
Founding  my  power  on  the  Buddha's  word  ! 
What  creed  so  clearly  might  consolidate 
Imperial  power,  as  this  of  quietism, 
Some  somnolent  non-assertion  of  men's  wills 
86 


ASOKA 

Against  mine  in  the  world,  their  hope  at  last 
For  innermost  non-essence,  slow  attain 'd 
Through  many  lives  of  meekness  more  and  more  ? 
Through  many  lives  of  weakness :  I  alone 
Strong,  unencumber'd  of  the  creed  imposed  ! 
These  priests  of  Brahma  (whom  I  nowise  hurt 
Now  they  are  harmless  !)  had  made  sorry  slaves 
With  their  pretensions  to  authority 
And  spiritual  power  over  men 
By  ceremonial  observances 
And  sacrifices  to  propitiate 
A  pandemonium  of  deities 
Conceived  above  all  power  imperial ! 
How  had  I  wasted  life  in  truckling  to  them, 
Cajoling,  flattering ;  and  been  weaken'd  by  it 
In  every  hour  of  my  governing ! 
How  had  I  been  their  puppet,  just  a  show 
Of  kinghood  :  but  for  these  few  cataclysms 
Happily  now  perform 'd  upon  their  heads 
Which  rid  me  of  their  menace.   Whereupon 
In  gratitude  to  Gautama,  behold 
These  steles  of  an  universal  peace 
Proclaiming  quietism ;  to  all  men 
Self-abnegation,  and  at  last  reward 
87 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

(Scarcely  by  grace  of  any  deity) , 
For  non-resistance,  in  a  nothingness : 
Myself  alone  remaining  as  some  god ; 
Asoka,  I,  supreme,  imperial ! 
May  I,  the  king,  attain  no  Buddhahood  ! 

What  worthy  system  were  there  of  a  world 
Without  some  dominant  superior 
To  order  and  devise,  plan  and  proclaim, 
Determining  the  Path,  making  the  Law 
Unto  the  diverse  disagreements  of 
The  dull  and  wrangling  peoples  ?  What  were  well 
Were  it  not  for  the  wisdom  of  some  man 
Eminent,  understanding,  capable 
Even  to  compel  obedience  overtly 
And  with  authority  overawe  the  heart 
And  mind  unto  subservient  content  ? 
These  priests  of  Brahma  were  a  wiser  folk 
Than  any  mendicant ;  and  e'en  within 
This  Order  of  the  Law  (in  monastery 
As  through  novitiate),  the  Law  prevails 
As  Gautama  devised  it,  and  the  Law 
Needs,  both,  and  finds  preceptors  wise  enough 
(Though  by  their  vow  not  menacing  to  me  !) 
88 


ASOKA 

To  discipline,  chastise,  enforce,  and  seem 

Authoritative  to  the  time  and  place. 

How  doth  this  plain  necessity  for  power 

And  for  obedience  run  through  all  our  ways 

Of  earth  and  men,  preventing  quietism 

Absolute,  abrogating  emptinesses 

Of  will  and  purpose,  proving  each  of  us 

Incapable  of  nothingness,  each  man 

Imperial  in  a  sort,  someway  supreme 

In  the  mere  life-assertion  every  day 

Of  breath  and  being.  And  the  greatest  man 

Is  the  most  dominant ;  the  happiest 

He  who  proclaims  and  can  enforce  decrees 

On  the  recalcitrant.   These  Brahmin  priests 

Were  greater  than  their  fellows ;  that  they  fell 

Because  a  greater  was  among  them,  I  — 

I,  though  low-born  of  caste,  by  strength  of  heart 

Brahmin  indeed  of  Brahmins,  greatest  of  them, 

Asoka,  king,  supreme,  imperial ! 

Ah,  but  a  greater  was  upon  the  earth  : 
Gautama,  the  Enlightened,  Blessed  One, 
He  whom  I  reverence,  who  without  decree 
Or  force  of  cataclysm,  nor  by  aid 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Of  any  power  material  could  compel 

All  men  to  yield  unto  His  purposes 

And  be  subservient  unendingly ! 

Even  Asoka,  in  defying  Him 

Who  counselled  uttermost  humility, 

Hath  bow'd  unto  His  power  and  become 

His  slave,  Asoka  who  establisheth 

Himself  supreme,  imperial  but  by  strength 

Of  Buddha's  Law  within  the  kingly  mind : 

Imperial  disciple  !   Would  that  I 

Knew  but  the  secret  of  His  prevalence, 

To  rule  without  decree,  command  by  strength 

Of  prescience  inborn  ;  and  be,  as  He, 

Buddha ;  in  mine  own  person,  as  a  creed  ! 


90 


PAUL 

A  MURMUR  is  of  many  men  around 

Unfriendly  (as  at  Thessalonica  and 

Philippi)  —  God  be  unto  me  a  shield 

And  strength  ;  for  I  shall  need  Him  when  I  stand 

High  there  on  Areopagus.   The  Jews 

Hate,  when  they  dare  indulge  their  hearts  to  hate, 

Even  with  the  hate  of  hounds  and  wolves  (I,  once, 

A  Grecian  Jew :  twice  venomized  ! ) ;  the  Greeks 

Shriek  shriller  than  the  Jews,  but  at  the  worst 

Hate  Jew  worse  than  this  Jesus  of  my  word. 

(Perchance  their  hatred  of  myself  as  Jew 

Will  melt  in  mockery  when  I  come  to  speak 

Of  truths  un- Jewish  and  a  novelty  ? ) 

That  thus  will  God  help,  guard,  if  not  by  peace 

And  goodwill  among  men,  at  least  by  strife 

Of  Greek  'gainst  Hebrew,  shielding  Christ  and  me  — 

A  Roman  citizen  as  they  may  know  — 

Beyond  the  fear  of  harm.   I  less  should  fear 

Were  mine  affliction  not  upon  mine  eyes : 

That  so  I  see  not  clearly,  but  as  darkling 

Perceive  these  scowling  faces  in  the  throng 

So  close  about.   But  I  will  swell  my  thought 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

With  inward  vision  and  beyond  their  frowns 

Draw  wisdom  with  courage  from  the  Source  of  both, 

Dispelling  hesitancy.  —  I  will  mount 

Mars'  Hill  and  speak  unto  the  Stoics  thence, 

The  Epicureans  and  idolaters. 

Athens  below  me  as  I  dimly  climb, 
All  Greece,  a  different  nation,  other  minds 
Than  Antioch,  than  Salamis,  despite 
That  Hellenism  of  the  Syrian  shores  — 
For  was  not  I  a  Jew  though  Hellenist ; 
Although  Cilician,  mystic  at  the  heart  ? 
These  are  not  mystics  at  the  heart  (for  all 
That  altar  to  the  Unknown  God  I  spell'd 
Below  in  Agora !),  but  men  of  sense 
(For  so,  in  the  moment's  need,  their  viewpoint  seems 
More  rational  than  formerly  —  than  mine  ?) 
Desirous  of  an  understanding  mind, 
As  I  in  private  converse  have  discern'd, 
Beyond  mere  superstition.  — How  to  meet 
Need  of  the  moment  by  the  word  of  God  ? 
How  render  unto  Pericles  (for  much 
Of  Athens'  history  I  late  have  learn'd, 
Her  rulers  and  philosophers)  in  speech 
92 


PAUL 

The  things  of  Pericles,  when  my  truths  be 
The  things  of  God  ?  —  And  yet  I  feel  that  God 
Is  logical  —  as  Greece  is  logos-wise ; 
Is  practical  —  as  I  am  practical : 
Apostle  laboring,  accomplishing 
By  argument  unto  the  moment's  need  — 
I  something  of  the  demagogue  at  soul, 
Half-Alcibiades,  Demosthenes, 
If  also  Plato  at  the  core  of  me  ! 
And  therefore  is  no  blasphemy  at  worst, 
But  verily  the  best  mere  man  may  do 
(Whilst  combating  their  soulless  Aristotle, 
To  waive  that  worth  of  Plato  they  would  scorn) 
If  God  be  made  a  purpose  practical 
(The  things  of  Pericles  made  God's  thereby!) 
Unto  the  reason,  practised  argument 
And  sophistry  that  fills  this  people  here. 
No  doubt  a  later  age  may  find  in  him, 
The  Stagirite,  much  inference  of  a  Mind 
Somewhat  omnipotent,  creative,  which 
Folk  shall  confuse  with  Him  I  'd  now  proclaim. 
Doubtless  the  peaceful  Platonism  in  me 
Of  reservation  beyond  earthly  strife, 
Of  resurrection,  what-not  after  death, 
93 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Shall  color  as  with  a  jargon  of  the  schools 
My  dogma  of  the  God  who,  also  Man, 
Concludeth  all,  yet  scarce  is  very  world  : 
Himself  a  part  of  it  whilst  still  the  whole. 
Yet  now  I  feel  me  toward  the  Stagirite 
Hostile  who  teacheth  isolation,  mind 
From  mind,  without  a  resolution  through 
Any  divinity  inherent  in  us 
As  we  are  men  material  here  and  now, 
Any  communion  as  of  charity 
Which  maketh  universals,  each  in  each, 
By  insight  and  by  sympathy,  not  by 
Analysis  of  common  characters 
As  in  the  scheme  abstractive  taught  of  him. 
Plato  were  more  my  creed,  in  truth,  save  he,  too, 
Suffer  interpretation  misconceived 
(As  now  these  men  of  Athens  would  construe 
Amiss  the  mystery !)  of  God  but  name 
For  generality  abstract  and  lost 
In  ether  of  the  spheres,  as  are  their  gods  — 
Leaving  poor  man  alone  and  earth  alone 
Disintegrant  as  in  their  Stoicism. 
Thus,  in  default  of  either  of  their  wisest 
(Opposing  Aristotle's  soullessness 
94 


PAUL 

Of  earth,  and  God  beyond  real  earth  or  man  ; 
Avoiding  Plato's  generality 
Of  world-salvation  through  the  archetype 
Beyond  real  reason ;  though  affirming  through 
Christ  the  creed's  universal  applicance), 
So  must  I  make  God  very  practical, 
Complaisant  to  the  motive  of  their  mind, 
Its  pseudo-wisdom  and  its  old  despair ! 

What  was  their  utmost  wisdom  ?    '  Know  thyself '  ! 
And  what  the  outcome  of  much  earnest  search 
Unguided  of  the  Christ  ?   Just  this  at  last : 
'  The  self  is  atom,  item  each  alone, 
'  Indifferently  to  the  wider  world 
1  Of  other  selves  sustaining  each  its  fate  — 
'  Body  or  spirit,  Stoic  either  way ; 
'  Epicurean  severally,  though  soul  — 
'  Imposed  by  all-soul  of  the  universe 
'  As  from  without.   The  names  we  give  the  gods 
'  Are  but  a  man's  emotions  clothed  with  false 
'  Impersonation  in  the  void  of  things.' 
There  the  scheme  ends  and  fails;  the  gnosticism, 
The  boasted  system  of  these  men  of  sense, 
Turns  to  the  nature  of  that  God  Unknown 
95 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

(The  atom,  else  the  generality ; 

Zero  or  void  —  who  can  determine  which  ?  — 

Alike  intended  of  Democritus, 

Zeno,  Parmenides,  or  Socrates  ! )  — 

The  Known,  the  Self;  because,  though  miscall'd  spirit, 

Regarded  as  the  body  (earth,  as  truth 

All-unregenerate  by  the  syllogism 

Which  proves  earth  false,  impossible  to  proof 

Unless  divine  in  essence  !),  mere  mine  or  thine ; 

A  Christ's  that  might  have  died  to  rise  no  more ; 

The  unity  assumed  :  nothing  of  God ; 

And  thus  God-nature,  nothing !  —  Can  a  man, 

With  such  as  these  to  hear  and  be  made  convert 

(Keen  disputants  imbued  of  paradox, 

Glorying  in  contradiction  if  but  clean-cut), 

Howe'er  he  truly  scorn  their  paradox 

Of  thee  and  me  ununion'd  of  a  God, 

Talk  mystic  doctrine  ;  or  hath  mystery 

Been  long  ago  to  logic-chopping  tongues 

Emptied  of  any  than  a  barren  fame  ? 

Were  that  a  service  unto  God,  to  speak 

Mere  esoteric  unity-through-Christ 

(As  through  some  All,  failing  the  truth  of  Self  !)  — 

Vicarious,  for  all  our  faith  in  it  — 


PAUL 

As  I  have  elsewhere  taught  it,  when  to  them 
'T  would  seem  so  stale  an  outcome,  just  a  myth 
At  best  of  Delphi  or  Eleusis  there  ? 
Ah,  rather,  take  Christ  as  the  type  of  each 
Successful  in  the  knowledge  of  Himself 
And  only  therefore  centrally  of  God 
And,  as  God,  savior  to  the  race  of  men  ! 
God  is  the  unity  their  wisdom  lacks, 
'T  is  true  (acceptance  of  the  Self  in  all 
It  knows  or  feels  or  hath  its  being  in : 
Self,  therefore  world-sustainer,  Christ  or  each  ! )  - 
T  is  true ;  nought  truer,  than  God's  inmost  truth. 
Yet  what  were  God  or  Christ,  were  Christ  or  God 
Not  yet  of  self,  nothing  of  self's  own  world, 
Unknown  as  were  the  fabled  Pythian  ?  — 
It  is  an  instance,  then,  to  lay  aside 
All  mystery  and  thus  to  serve  best  God 
By  making  very  self-like  Him  we  seek  — 
Method  of  Socrates  ;  though  not,  as  that  one 
By  isolative  world-analysis 
And  negative  demarcation,  proving  self 
Or  God  alike  but  that  which  truth  is  not ! 
For  fact  at  last  is  still  the  truth  we  seek, 
Still  subject  of  salvation,  I  or  thou 
97 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Saved  but  by  proof  that  each  is  yet  his  world 

And  therefore  universal  and  the  God. 

It  is  an  instance,  then,  of  '  Know  Thyself ', 

The  God  Thou  art,  not  as  a  myth  outworn 

Of  hyperhumans,  powers  impossible 

At  war  and  lust  within  the  world  (still  less 

Without  the  world,  by  Platonism  !)  —  but  just 

Knowledge,  the  world  as  faith  self-makes  it,  shown 

Contain 'd  within  the  life  of  each  of  men 

So  far  as  wisdom  is  the  life  of  him 

And  holds  the  world  concluded  of  his  strength. 

With  this,  the  truth  I  see  within,  I  mount 

Fearless  and  foeless  to  the  speaking-place 

(Their  frowns,  as  not  when  Socrates  stood  here, 

Melted  to  semblance  of  some  courtesy), 

My  speech  determined  in  unwonted  guise 

To  meet  this  moment :  not  the  Unknown  God 

Their  superstition  and  idolatry 

(For  so  I  see  their  sense,  by  loftier  sense 

Of  understanding  contravening  theirs  !), 

9  Wilder'd  by  logic  of  the  Stagirite 

Or  dream  of  Plato,  hath  reduced  to  nought ; 

Such  as  I  preach'd,  through  Christ's  authority 

98 


PAUL 

And  mystical  identity,  before 

At  Antioch  or  Salamis  ;  and  such 

As,  if  without  unreasoning  faith  in  Christ, 

Mere  negative  analysis  must  rest  in, 

If  Christ  be  vicar  and  not  type  of  each 

Self-savior  universalized :  but  now 

(For  't  is  my  second  calling,  first  to  faith 

In  blindness,  now  to  wisdom  inwardly  — 

Mine  eyes'  affliction  serving  in  good  stead!) 

Without  least  blasphemy,  most  practical ; 

(Demagogue  I,  most  suited  to  the  time 

And  place,  so  thus  most  serviceable) :  the  God 

Of  Knowledge,  universal  world  of  each  — 

Prosper'd,  made  godly  most,  by  knowledge  of  it ! 

They  question  me,  asking  to  hear  my  truth.  — 

"  Ye  men  of  Athens,  hear  me  while  I  speak 
"The  God  ye  ignorantly  worship  :  God  !  " 


99 


PETER 

NOW  is  the  hour  of  failure  of  my  life, 
The  sinking  of  the  star  within  my  soul 
Which  hitherto  hath  led  me  and  sustain'd 
Through  divers  tribulations  since  that  night 
Accursed  when  I  did  deny  Him  thrice. 
Since  that  dark  hour  of  Jesus'  earthly  death 
Hath  Christ  in  me,  the  risen  Spirit  of  God, 
Upheld  and  temper'd  with  a  living  strength 
Of  infinite  salvation :  a  commission, 
By  overflood  beyond  my  need  alone,  . 
To  be  Apostle,  Christ's  evangelist 
Unto  the  saving  of  the  souls  of  men. 
Till  now,  hath  Christ  been  power  in  me ;  but  now 
I  fail,  am  swoon'd  in  spirit,  am  as  though 
Christ  had  not  risen  from  the  dead,  but  lay 
Still  in  the  tomb  as  I  so  fear  to  lie. 
I  am  grown  old  so  very  suddenly ; 
My  limbs  half-palsied  with  the  stricken  heart 
In  panic  at  the  last.   The  last  is  come ; 
And  I,  with  what  of  palsied,  frenzied  speed 
Remains,  am  fleeing  like  a  thief  in  the  night 
From  Rome,  from  Nero  and  a  martyr's  crown. 
100 


PETER 

I  am  unworthy  of  a  martyr's  crown. 
I  flee  from  glory  :  utterly  unfit. 

The  congregation  hath  for  many  days 
(Such  Sheep  as  Caesar's  savagery  hath  spared) 
In  secret  meeting-places  pray'd  of  me 
To  make  departure,  in  the  name  of  Christ 
(As  Christ  permitted  to  our  fmitude) 
Preserving  from  the  persecution  this 
Enfeebled  body,  sorrow-stricken  head, 
For  new  apostlehood  in  fairer  fields 
And  less  distressful  days.   I  did  resist, 
Knowing  the  cowardice  their  words  awoke 
Within  me,  feeling  that  escape  was  worse 
Than  any  bodily  death.   But  now  I  yield  me 
Unto  temptation  irresistible, 
Stampeded  by  my  fear ;  and  mask  that  fear 
In  resignation  to  the  call  of  God 
Afar,  who  dwells  no  longer  in  myself 
As  erst !  —  Could  Christ  Himself,  might  He  appear, 
Condemn  my  soul  more  utterly  than  I  ? 
My  limbs  swing  quavering  onward  ;  but  my  soul, 
Abject  before  the  judgment-bar  of  Christ, 
Resists  itself ;  would  turn  upon  this  path 
101 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Back  to  Gehenna  were  it  yawning  for  me  — 
Save  that  my  soul,  not  yet  so  shameless-lost, 
Acknowledges  no  right  to  martyrdom. 
And  therefore  must  shamefacedly  away. 

Yet,  were  it  not  some  subtler  torment  still 
Of  terror,  self-disguised,  which  I  detect 
In  this  self-condemnation  barring  me 
From  best  nobility  ?    The  bodily  fear, 
Welcomes  it  not  the  abnegation,  but 
Because  the  self-distrust  is  easier, 
The  abrogation  of  all  heavenly  hope 
Evades  the  calling  to  the  cruel  cross  ? 
Deem'd  Christ  not  (knowing  every  thought  of  man) 
Me  worthy,  as  poor  sinful  men  are  found 
Faltering  and  repenting  every  hour, 
To  be  His  conservator  upon  earth, 
Holder  of  mystic  keys  to  ope  the  door 
Of  earth  to  heaven ;  and  call'd  me  by  the  name 
Cephas,  the  rock-foundation  of  the  faith  ? 
Foresaw  He  not  these  dregs  of  sin  in  me, 
This  fainting  of  the  body  ?   Yet  said  He  not : 
The  soul  is  willing  though  the  flesh  be  weak  — 
And  therefore  not  unworthy  though  it  sleep 
1 02 


PETER 

As  slept  it  there  in  His  Gethsemane  ? 
1  know  so  surely  what  Christ's  self  would  do. 
He  would  be  hasting  from  the  ends  of  earth 
(Could  but  one  soul  be  saved  for  God  thereby) 
Toward  crucifixion  here  the  second  time  ! 
Perchance  Christ  hasteth  now  to  save  my  soul 
Out  of  the  dismal  slumber  of  this  night !  — 
Awake,  my  soul !   Methinks  there  doth  appear, 
Like  to  quick  gleams  of  dawn  athwart  the  way 
(The  hour  of  dawn  is  come  and  cocks  do  crow 
As  once  in  far-off  sad  Jerusalem  !), 
The  spirit  of  Jesus  !   Those,  His  hands ;  and  that, 
His  white-robed  person  as  from  that  first  tomb 
It  rose  with  angels  o'er  the  sepulchre  — 
I  saw  it  not,  but  feel  it  was  as  now  ! 
And,  there,  that  burst  of  morning-shine  upon 
The  mist  of  this  low  country,  beams  His  face  : 
Beloved  features  seen  as  long  ago, 
Though  never  latterly.  And  these  His  feet 
Are  stirring  in  the  radiant  risen  dust ! 

It  is  the  morning  and  the  night  is  past. 
The  day  hath  purpose  of  evangel  still.  — 
Master !   I  turn.    I  know  Thou  wilt  forgive. 
103 


CONSTANTINE 

A  CREDIBLE  wonder !   '  In  the  sign  of  the  cross, 
'  Lo  !  thou  shalt  conquer ! '  —  And  destroy  I  did 
Mine  enemy.    And  all  that  appertain'd 
Unto  his  power  hath  fallen  mine  appanage. 
And  I  am  Imperator  unopposed. 

I  am  inclined  unto  the  way  of  Christ 
Without  such  intervention,  knowing  well 
The  fruit  of  victory  were  best  a  peace, 
The  source  of  peace  best  found  within  the  soul, 
And  the  soul  best  at  peace  within  her  world 
When  loving  most  (love,  but  a  sympathy 
Of  world-control  —  as  I,  being  unopposed, 
Am  fain  to  love  !)  beyond  the  body's  bounds. 
Therefore  I  would  not  be  myself  the  God 
And  worshipp'd  of  the  nations  as  were  needs 
The  cult  did  I  declare  for  idol-Rome 
Her  priests  and  deities ;  for  so  myself, 
Being  above  humanity,  were  then 
Incapable  of  sympathy,  perverse 
In  every  action  and  impolitic, 
Blind  to  the  signs  of  the  times  (this  cross,  the  chief ! ) , 
104 


CONSTANTINE 

Regardless  of  all  rights  or  righteousnesses 
Beyond  my  person  proven  in  itself 
Alone  invaluable  ;  and  my  soul 
Were  thus  confined  to  dwell  within  my  breast, 
Nor  could  expand  with  zeal  beneficent. 
Nor  do  the  reasons  of  best  politic 
Longer  allow  a  God  Imperial 
Where  now  so  clear  majority  of  men 
Decline  the  worship,  are  recalcitrant 
Even  in  face  of  Diocletian's  beasts  ; 
And  plain  rebellious  where  't  were  folly  quite 
Wantonly  to  provoke  with  such  demand. 
Nor  would  I  be  the  Stoic,  shut  within 
The  circuit  of  his  breast,  whose  idleness 
Of  dull  indifference  vainly  would  deny 
All  vital  interest  in  men's  affairs. 
How  be  as  old  Aurelius  meditating 
Conduct  of  life  as  though  the  life  of  the  world 
Were  wholly  alien  (whilst  under  his  hand 
Men  shook  and  suffer'd  !),  when  unto  mine  hand 
Are  peoples  teeming,  and  the  power  of  well 
Or  ill  within  the  hollow  of  my  palm, 
And  daily  everything  to  judge  and  do 
Pertaining  to  the  conduct  of  the  world 
105 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

As  't  were  my  life,  as  I  must  feel  for  it 
And  judge  for  it  and  wield  it  as  't  were  mine  ? 
Or  how  indulge  in  dream  Philonian  — 
Platonic,  Hermetic,  Saccan,  who  may  care  ?  — 
Of  aeon-emanation  and  exile 
(In  mystification-subtlety)  of  God 
From  world  and  world  from  life,  sith  all  within 
The  soul  is  held  but  as  some  gnosis-scheme 
Of  Logos-wrought  construction,  nothing  like 
(Nor  did  Plotinus  scare  the  ghost  away, 
For  all  his  intermediacy  of  worlds  !) 
A  life  where  all  is  opportunity 
And  all  is  opportune  unto  the  soul 
(That  takes  the  trick  of  opportunity  !) 
To  see  and  feel  the  life  of  thousand  souls 
As  one,  by  sympathy  to  move  and  sway 
All  purposes  and  passions  to  mine  own  ; 
And  thus,  by  playing  the  god  within  the  world 
Whilst  still  man,  learn  the  truth  of  God-within, 
Not  God-beyond,  the  system  of  earth-things  — 
For  thus,  I  deem,  doth  Hosius  seem  to  teach, 
Seeking  to  turn  me  to  the  ways  of  Christ  — 
Of  Christ,  Himself  the  system,  that  He  be 
In  guise  a  man,  unworshipp'd,  spat  upon 
106 


CONSTANTINE 

And  crucified  even  because  His  soul 

Was  great  beyond  the  body,  and  therethrough 

(As  may  mine  in  my  plenitude  of  power !) 

Did  feel  and  sympathize  with  life  of  men ! 

Such,  God  should  be  —  a  God  beyond  myself 

(Would  I  be  Christ,  to  suffer  as  the  God, 

When  power  with  sympathy  pertains  to  kings  ? ) 

And  yet  within  the  working  of  the  world  : 

And  thus  within  myself  that  I  shall  wield 

Power  by  fostering,  not  by  opposing, 

('Ware  yet  to  him  who  sole  opposed  my  mood  !) 

The  prevalent  purposes  of  many  men 

Made  thereby  loyal  subjects. —  What  care  I 

For  heresy,  for  this  new  Arius'  creed 

(One  hears  fresh-rumor'd  through  the  scandall'd 

West 

Out  of  the  East  of  thousand  fantasies  !) 
Concerning  Godhood's  man-embodiment, 
Its  unity  or  difference  in  God  — 
When  plain  I  see  the  purpose  through  all  creeds 
Toward  world-religion  fit  for  private  life 
Since  seated  in  the  soul  of  all  alike 
Who  find  God  in  the  sympathy  with  all 
Honest  opinion  !  — Whence  I  shall  announce  — 
107 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

When  the  due  time  come,  and  Licinius, 

This  Eastern  half-Augustus  who  remains 

'Twixt  me  and  absolute  power,  shall  in  turn 

Be  ruin'd,  and  I  have  leisure  then  to  love 

In  way  of  Christ  as  Hosius  would  approve  it !  — 

Conversion  of  the  State  as  of  myself 

Unto  the  Christian  teaching  :  scarce  to  crush 

The  Stoic  or  the  Mystic  —  let  them  dream 

Along  their  ways  of  life,  which  shall  be  safe 

(Save  if  by  men's  insistent  loud  demand 

Their  persecution  should  prove  politic  ? ) 

Within  my  bounds  of  empire  ;  for  they  lack 

The  worldhood  as  the  Godhood  ;  and  shall  pass 

Without  mine  intervention.   And  within 

The  Christian  covenant  shall  every  soul  — 

So  long  as  he  be  quiet  citizen  — 

Enjoy  respect  unto  his  private  creed  : 

Save  only,  should  majority  demand, 

(Surely,  for  reasons  of  a  quiet  State) 

I  well  might  silence  him  call'd  Arius, 

Else  him  who  may  oppose  him  —  who  may  care  ? 

Then  let  the  plausible  miracle  have  sway 
Sufficient  to  enforce  within  my  heart 
108 


CONSTANTINE 

Soul's  natural  propensity,  give  excuse 
For  politic  conversion  to  the  creed 
Which  seems  to  bode  prosperity  and  peace 
With  power  by  insight  of  the  hearts  of  men, 
Unfold  the  Labarum  above  the  host ! 
In  this  sign  shalt  thou  conquer '  —  credibly  ! 


109 


ATHANASIUS 

MYSELF  against  the  world !  —  that  here  I  stand 
(Though  courteous,  Caesar's  chill  magnificence) 
Exiled,  alone  among  the  Treviri ! 
Nay,  worse,  Nicsea's  declaration  quite 
Betray'd  of  men  ;  that  I  of  all  alone 
Uphold  the  truth ;  and  every  man  beside 
Of  all  who  dare  lift  voice  and  make  belief 
Effective,  felt  within  the  ways  of  life, 
Cleave  to  that  Arian  error,  how  our  Christ 
Were  demi-god,  not  God  essentially  ! 
Christ,  and  is  this  the  working  of  Thy  Word 
That  Thou  shouldst  be  betray'd  a  second  time  ? 

Christ,  and,  alas  !  this  momentary  doubt 
Of  my  poor  self  against  the  whole  wide  world  : 
The  doubt  of  my  clear  vision  !   Would  Thy  care 
E'er  have  committed  truth  to  me  alone  ? 
Is  it  the  loneliness,  whilst  sick  at  heart 
I  mourn  in  this  cold  boreal  clime  our  sun 
And  sweetness  of  the  Alexandrian  air, 
That  all-congeals  the  passion  of  my  soul 
no 


ATHANASIUS 

To  mist  and  dimness  and  the  ice  of  doubt, 
Deadening  faith  ?    Or  doth  Thy  spirit  at  last 
Desert  Thine  instrument  of  Providence, 
Leaving  me  naked,  inspirationless, 
Defeated  and  acknowledged  desolate, 
Myself  in  error ;  and  mine  enemies 
(I  fancied  Thine)  but  mine  triumphantly 
Because  within  Thy  will  inscrutable 
Chosen  truth-messengers  mysteriously  ? 
All  were  as  dark,  O  Christ,  if  truth  were  so. 
For  me,  I  could  not  see,  being  in  wrong ; 
I  could  not  understand  this  being  in  wrong 
Because  mine  error's  fault  would  blind  the  soul. 
But  either  way  must  I  have  faith  in  Thee 
For  utter  Godhead,  being  by  Thy  will 
Born  as  I  am  to  this  belief  in  Thee. 
And,  right  or  wrong,  must  speak  Thy  gospel  still, 
Whether  by  plenitude  of  inward  light 
Thy  servant,  or  by  plenitude  of  sin 
Thine  anti-Christ  self-blinded  of  the  void  ! 
Man  scarce  may  know  whether  the  will  be  free 
Or  fated  of  Thy  Providence ;  but  this 
Too  bitterly  I  know,  that,  right  or  wrong, 
Man  is  but  blind  unless  by  grace  of  Thee 
in 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

His  blindness  proveth  wisdom.  But  Thy  grace 
Extendeth  not  to  me.    And  lost  am  I. 

Am  not  I  lost  because  I  never  knew 
The  grace  of  moderation,  realizing 
Not  this  dilemma  of  the  blinded  flesh  ? 
That  I  but  stand  more  fervently  confirm  'd 
(By  self-deceit,  so  be  it  by  Thy  will  ?) 
In  hatred  of  that  half-god  humanhood 
Their  creeds  would  foist  upon  Thee  (being  assured 
By  creature-blindness  in  this  human  soul  — 
Christ  save  the  contradiction !  —  Thou  couldst  ne'er 
Be  any  compound  of  humanity 
As  such  with  God  ;  but  that  Thy  manhood  were 
The  Godhead  through  and  through  and  so  self- 
known  !)  — 

That  I  may  never  waver  in  belief 
(To  fall,  if  fall  I  must,  in  self -despite), 
Preventeth  not  this  keen  soul-scrutiny 
Which  showeth  other  minds  as  self-deceived 
Doubtless,  at  best  as  wholly  self-unknown, 
Dependent  on  Thy  grace  for  right  belief, 
As  I ;  and  therefore  worth,  none  less  than  I, 
The  pity  and  charity  wherewith  Thy  mind 

112 


ATHANASIUS 

Must  ever  regard  this  mole-like  mind  of  man. 
To  what  end  Thou  might'st  misinform  Thy  seed 
(Nay,  rather,  permit  man's  own  perversity 
Some  want  of  Thy  correction)  scarce  were  theme 
For  any  mind  of  man  e'er  to  admit 
Unto  his  ignorance.   Though  this  at  least 
Is  sure,  that  now  in  ignorance  self-known 
Mine  ignorance  uprears  regenerate ; 
Now  for  the  first  truly  acclaiming  Thee  ! 
Now  for  the  first  truly  a  man  of  God, 
A  man  God-like  as  Thou  art  God  made  Man. 
Thine,  Christ,  the  Gnosis ;  ours,  the  Ignorance  : 
Alike  in  self -acceptance.   And,  since  man 
Hath  thereby  knowledge  of  his  ignorance, 
Are  we,  as  Thou  in  Arius'  half-creed, 
Each  demi-god  ;  and  Arius  were  right 
If  but  with  our  humanity  concern'd  ; 
Each  man,  some  incarnation  of  Thy  truth, 
Divine  because  self-seen  in  ignorance  ; 
Yet  human  sheerly.   And  myself  were  wrong, 
Who  fancied  Thy  Christ-incarnation  other 
Than  thuswise  human  wholly  in  that  Thou 
Wast  cognizant  of  being  still  divine  !  — 
What  further  subtlety  were  plausible 
113 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Beyond  such  understanding,  by  Thy  grace, 

As  this  vouchsafed  ?   How  longer  make  dispute 

Concerning  Thy  humanity's  degree 

Of  Godhood  or  of  humanhood,  where  both 

Alike  are  property  incorporate 

Of  every  man  ?    T  were  but  that  we,  being  flesh, 

Achieve  this  Godhood  of  self-cognizance, 

Acknowledgment  unto  ourselves  (by  grace 

Of  Thee)  of  this  our  ignorance  inborn ; 

Whereas  Thy  Godhood,  for  the  sins  of  the  world 

In  ignorance  conceived,  didst  take  upon  Thee 

The  partiality  of  innocence ; 

That,  by  the  spectacle  of  innocence 

Godly  in  perfect  self-acknowledgment, 

Might  men  discover  in  themselves  the  seed 

Of  Thy  divinity  —  as  I  to-day. 

What  further  subtlety  were  possible  ? 

Yet,  Christ,  perchance,  in  these  cool  boreal  lands  — 

Who  knows  ?  —  where  passion  warps  not,  but  the 

sight 

Within  were  at  the  acme,  and  the  man, 
Imbued  with  confidence  of  innocence, 
In  natural  exaltation  might  assume 
World-comprehension  quite  without  Thy  grace  — 
114 


ATHANASIUS 

A  comprehension  wantonly  supposed 
Of  wisdom,  not  of  selfish  ignorance  — 
To  such  a  man  might  not  this  doctrine  seem, 
To-day  which  I  inherit  and  achieve, 
Some  warrant  to  degrade  in  parity 
Thy  manhood  to  my  manhood,  thus  to  mock 
Thee  with  assumption  of  a  full  divine 
For  man,  as  Thou  assumedst  humanity? 
Pardon  the  wanton  word  !   Yon  Arius 
Degradeth  Thee  not  as  would  such  a  man 
(And  till  this  hour  had  I  but  been  as  he 
In  crass  self-confidence  —  though  spared  his 

folly!) 

By  such  apotheosis  of  his  kind  ! 
For  within  such  an  arrogance  might  no  law 
(For  no  humility  would  look  for  it !) 
Of  logic  countervene  still  to  maintain 
Distinction  intervening  as  reveal'd 
Between  Thee  and  Thy  people  ne'ertheless. 

Therefore,  O  Lord,  unto  Thy  revelation 
I  still  appeal  against  this  Arian  world, 
Not  unto  logic  ratiocinant 
Nor  unto  grace  of  comprehension ;  but 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

To  faith  in  revelation  !   That  alone 

(Ay,  plain  I  feel  it  in  this  moment's  need) 

Can  save  our  ignorance  from  claim  at  last 

To  perfect  parity  with  truth  of  Thee 

And  with  Thy  wisdom,  Godhood.  —  Thus,  O 

Christ, 

Alone  in  Treviri  my  soul  appeals 
Not  more  to  argument  which  leads  too  far 
For  safety  of  poor  human  ignorance 
(Scarce  to  a  Caesar,  seem  he  ne'er  so  kind !) 
But,  to  transfiguration  :  Christ  reveal'd  — 
Thy  revelation,  against  Arius  ! 


116 


AUGUSTINE 

IT  is  not  that  I  too  well  knew  the  sweets 
Of  the  old  false  way  (he  my  natural  son 
Adeodatus  was  some  proof  of  them  !); 
But  rather  that  this  tumult  at  the  walls, 
This  thunder  of  the  Vandal  horde's  attack, 
Hath  meaning  and  prejudgment  of  a  new 
Wise  order  founded  in  the  way  of  Christ 
As  over  against  the  way  of  heathen  gods 
Which  we,  though  followers  and  folk  of  Christ, 
Must  represent  and  still  uphold  in  the  breach 
Against  God's  Genseric !   I  little  heed 
(Though  in  itself  his  error  kill  the  soul !) 
That  he  profess  —  for  thus  the  rumor  runs  — 
Fiercely  that  heresy  of  Arius 
The  anomoean  — as  I  still  less  heed 
That  I,  the  staunch  supporter  of  the  truth, 
Held  mysteries  Manichaean  in  those  days 
Of  youth-perversity  and  carnal  lust. 

For  none  less  I  stand  representative 
Of  Rome  imperial,  the  Christless  State, 
117 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

The  City  not  of  God  though  Christ's  in  name. 
And  he  no  less,  though  nominally  none 
Of  Christian  principle,  denying  Christ's 
Incarnate  Godhood  by  declaring  Him 
Created  if  divine — he,  Genseric, 
But  battles  in  the  cause  of  order  new, 
Destroying  that  the  Lord  may  build  again 
On  a  clean  field  when  we  unworthy  both, 
And  all  unworthy  that  are  men  with  us 
Alive,  lie  swept  from  out  the  path  of  God ; 
And  God's  own  City  may  itself  arise 
Perchance  on  earth  even  as  now  on  high. 
Thus  much  were  my  conviction  which  the  mind 
Must  cling  to  for  some  comfort :  I  must  fall 
And  with  me  all  mine  African  great  Church 
For  Christ's  sake  and  in  Christ's  name,  over- 

whelm'd 

'Neath  armed  heresy  that  burns  and  slays 
By  mercy  Providential,  knowing  none. 
Such  the  sole  comfort :  that  God's  wisdom  rules 
In  worst  disaster !  —  And  this  human  heart 
Is  sore  and  sorrowing  and  self-ashamed, 
Saying  unto  the  God  who  calleth  me 
Soon  to  His  presence  as  this  weak  frame  yields 
118 


AUGUSTINE 

Worn-out  with  years  —  saying  to  God  :  '  I  heed 
Indeed  the  lesson ;  but  mine  heart  is  sore.'  — 

O  thou  great  City  of  Christ  in  Africa 
For  whose  establishment  mine  earnest  years 
With  voice  and  hand  and  screed  devotedly 
Have  struggled  and  attempted  in  the  name 
Of  God's  Word  and  the  Will  of  Him  who  died  ! 
O  thou,  God's  grace  upon  the  face  of  earth, 
Earth's  inspiration  faith-fill'd,  leading  on 
Each  member  of  the  body  politic, 
Each  person  of  the  City  of  Earth,  in  God 
From  grossness  of  the  carnal  lust  and  strife 
Toward  peace  of  heavenly  perfectedness  — 
Thou  Church  !  —  to  see  thee  perish  utterly 
Even  as  I  faint  and  am  not  swift  to  save  ; 
Even  as  I  pass  and  never  may  return 
To  be  thy  builder  and  renew  thy  strength  ! 
Verily,  verily  the  heart  is  sore 
(O  Lord,  forgive  the  old  man  full  of  days  !). 
Ah  !  to  see  all  the  faithful  stricken  down, 
Blinded  and  scourged,  robb'd,  ravish'd,  and  enslaved, 
The  bishop  and  the  presbyter,  the  flock 
Shepherded  of  them,  one  and  all  betray'd 
119 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

Unto  the  ravening  of  the  Vandal  wolves ! 

And  to  desert  my  people  at  the  last, 

Myself  to  steal  away  unto  my  God 

Whilst  they  my  people  suffer  at  the  maw 

Of  Genseric,  I  leaving  them  alone ; 

Evading  as  a  traitor  from  the  world  : 

Entering  lone  into  felicity  ! 

And  to  reflect  that,  most  of  all,  our  woes 

Have  come  of  too  keen  controversial 

Dispute,  dividing  peoples  patriot  else 

(Nay,  placing  dogma  and  our  discipline 

Above  all  civil  duty),  and  thereby 

Denuding  provinces  of  self-defence  ; 

In  name  of  such  and  such  a  pettiest  point 

Of  doctrine  persecuting  ruthlessly, 

When  all  by  some  complacent  compromise, 

Haply  as  close  to  truth  as  either  creed 

(I  being  in  error  acknowledged,  many  times  !), 

Had  saved  strength  for  the  struggle  to  sustain 

Life  of  the  Church  against  this  Vandal  death  ! 

And  I  have  been  chief  controversialist 

Through  all  my  days — O  Lord,  the  heart  is  sore ! 

Forgiveness,  Christ !   Did  not  Thyself,  as  now 
120 


AUGUSTINE 

Thy  Church,  but  perish  that  this  world  might  live  ? 

Did  not  Thy  death  ensure  to  all  mankind 

The  freedom  of  God's  City  (by  Thy  Grace 

Against  our  all-demerit)  ?   And  shall  now 

Thy  Church,  so  wholly  Thine,  perish  in  vain  ? 

What  are  the  failures  of  the  private  man, 

Mine  errors  multifold  upon  me  proved, 

But  fair  successes  in  the  Plan  of  God, 

Points  in  procedure  of  His  Providence  ? 

Surely,  of  human  sin  original 

Accumulated  through  the  thousand  years 

Of  Rome  and  Godlessness,  am  I  but  God's 

Exemplar,  and  the  Church  that  was  my  work 

But  instance  of  the  worthlessness  of  man 

Who  builds  for  earth  without  full  faith  that  God 

Will  alter  earth  after  His  own  behest 

Nor  heed  our  disappointment !   Let  mine  heart 

Be  sore,  that  in  its  bitterness  be  proved 

The  impotence  of  dreams  Pelagian 

(Asserting  man's  too-independent  power 

Of  self-regeneration  by  good- will !) 

Which  I  opposed,  but  in  opposing  made, 

By  my  too-sure  assertion  of  the  truth, 

Mine  own  !  Ay,  Lord  !  let  then  mine  heart  be  sore  !  — 

121 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

0 

Let  then  mine  heart  be  sore ;  that  Genseric 

May  blindly  represent  Thee,  wreak  Thy  will 

On  Rome's  inherited  philosophies, 

Her  dogmas  and  denials,  sophisms  all, 

Pagan  or  Christian  —  and  myself  have  been 

Chief  churchman  of  their  sophists !   In  the  world 

Is  all  Thy  will.   As  now  unto  Thy  will 

And  to  the  City  of  God  on  earth,  the  Church 

Of  faith  beyond  denial,  I  resign 

My  Bishophood.  —  For  I  have  known  the  sweets 

Of  the  old  false  way  :  and  the  heart  is  sore. 


122 


AVERROES 

WHAT  though  the  Caliph  and  the  questioners 
Condemn  ?    Shall  that  affect  philosophy  ? 
Shall  the  religion  of  the  common  mind 
Reprove  mine  Aristotle  ?    He,  be  it  sure, 
Were  scarce  fit  food  for  zealot-ignorance  ! 
The  culture  of  the  highest  were  no  cure 
For  crude  fanaticism  !    At  their  complaint 
Thus  much  I  may  admit.  — But  none  the  less 
Is  the  religion  of  the  Prophet  nought 
Considerable  to  the  cultured  mind ; 
Nowise  respectable  to  reasoning  ! 
Let  their  Mohammed  in  his  purblind  zeal 
Control  and  guide  them,  fervently  enough 
If  quite  inconsequently,  in  a  way 
Of  rectitude  sufficient  to  their  wants. 
But  let  them  not  presume  to  teach  me  creeds 
Contrary  to  my  reason,  when  the  mind 
Under  that  guidance  of  the  Stagirite 
Hath  earnestly  achieved,  beyond  their  ken, 
A  knowledge  of  the  universal  law 
Whereto  the  Prophet  is  as  nothingness.  — 
Mohammed,  for  the  ignorant  who  need 
123 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

A  sign  and  symbol ;  but  the  Stagirite, 

In  perspicacity  of  intellect 

Preceptor  to  the  cultured  :  such  the  way 

Of  compromise !   I  never  meant  to  teach 

The  universe  of  lore  impersonal 

Unto  their  passionate  vulgarity ; 

And  do  regret  vulgarity  was  taught 

Truths  beyond  comprehension  of  the  crowd, 

Hence  to  their  blindness  false.   But,  for  myself, 

Never  will  I  retract ;  and  I  defy 

Caliph  and  questioners  to  do  their  worst 

In  name  of  ignorance.   Philosophy 

Shall  still  sustain  me  even  unto  death  ! 

Never  will  I  retract ;  but  fain  would  seek 
Still  further  insight  of  the  ways  of  truth 
Absolute  and  unquestionable  !   Yet, 
How  strange  the  schism,  how  lone  this  intellect 
(Supposed  an  universal  operance 
Of  truth  alike  in  every  man  of  men  !) 
In  segregation  from  the  fond  belief 
Of  thousands  of  our  people  !   Them  I  Ve  judged 
For  right  and  wrong,  doom'd  them  to  weal  or  woe 
On  plain  assumption  of  some  common  ground 
124 


AVERROES 

Self-evident  and  cognizable  alike 
By  clown  or  Cadi,  of  a  moral  law 
Applicable,  with  grade  but  of  degree, 
To  child  or  Caliph  —  yet  at  length  I  find  me 
An  old  man  isolate,  assail'd  by  all, 
If  so  be,  that  my  cognizance  transcends 
In  kind  as  in  degree  their  ignorance, 
And  leaves  me  with  my  Stagirite  alone, 
Gnostic  of  God's  eternal  scheme  of  things 
Whereof  not  one  of  thousands  round  me  here, 
These  citizens  and  priests  of  Cordova 
(Themselves  components  one  and  all  alike 
As  soul-partakers  in  God's  intellect), 
Hath  any  inkling  ;  every  intellect, 
Save  mine,  all-unenlighten'd  of  the  truth 
Which  constitutes  them  and  they  constitute  ! 
And  thus  must  I  resort  to  doctrine  scarce 
Compatible  with  any  universe 
Of  law-wrought  intellect,  but  in  itself 
Too  like  their  crude  religion  :  how  the  mind 
Of  them  who  with  my  reason  disagree 
May  scarce  at  all  partake  of  final  truth, 
But  rightly  rests  whence  none  may  hope  to  lift 
Unto  the  light ;  I,  in  mine  arrogance, 
125 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Missing  that  fair  solution  which  might  teach 
Salvation  to  the  ignorant  and  still 
(Not,  as  their  error,  by  Mohammed's  creed) 
Achieve  truth-satisfaction !   Compromise 
Or  no,  must  my  philosophy  provide 
Religion  in  the  very  terms  of  truth, 
Knowledge  in  passionate  belief  ;  else  fail 
For  me,  for  them  alike.   For  life  is  so, 
Passionate  in  and  through  the  Gnosis,  still 
Cognizant  though  the  blood  with  faith  be  mad  ! 
Wherein  have  I  then  by  philosophy 
Miss'd  the  religion ;  wherein  doth  their  creed 
Show  possibility  of  competence 
Unto  the  standard  of  a  tested  truth  ? 
For,  were  their  ignorant  zeal  some  adumbration 
But  of  a  system  they  would  fain  believe ; 
And  were  my  consciousness  of  cosmic  law 
But  applicable  to  each  actual  fact 
Of  personal  experience  (not  as  now 
Too  subtly  academic),  how  might  we 
But  reach  some  fair  agreement,  none  the  worse 
Of  logic  or  devotion,  for  the  new 
World-reconciliation  ?    And  without 
Such  reamalgamation  might  the  world 
126 


AVERROES 

Well  be  regarded  as  no  universe 
Substance  of  law  nor  subject  of  a  faith  ! 

What,  then,  the  requisite  ;  that  faith  like  theirs 
Might  truly  mean  an  Aristotle's  lore 
Adequate  to  an  universe  whose  God 
Can  scarce  be  but  as  Caliph  overruling 
The  human  populace  by  Cadi's  voice 
(Mohammed,  but  some  Cadi  speaking  under 
A  Caliph,  not  of  Cordova,  Bagdad, 
Forsooth,  yet  governing  from  aether-throne)  ? 
What  truth,  perchance  within  the  reach  of  all, 
Might  yield  unto  the  world  eternity 
In  place  of  some  creation  ;  to  the  soul 
Universality  in  place  of  death 
And  judgment-doom  imagined  of  their  creed  ? 
And,  of  my  part,  what  liberality 
Of  emphasis  within  the  scheme  of  truth 
Learn'd  of  the  Stagirite  might  bring  my  law 
To  daily  application  and  infuse 
Enthusiasm  of  a  moral  creed 

Within  the  serious  teaching  ?  —  Ay,  what  more  true 
Than  just  this  yearning  of  mine  intellect 
To  search  and  reach  unto  a  loftier  plane 
127 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Than  any  yet  achieved,  that  therein  may 
My  loneliness  have  solace  and  my  lore 
Illumine  their  religion  that  it  prove 
Consonant  with  philosophy  ?    What  fact 
Of  faith  more  patent  than  their  striving  toward 
Personal  satisfaction  in  some  sight 
Of  system,  order,  though  their  order  be 
Too  much  anthropomorphic  ?   Were  the  truth 
Even  as  the  faith  a  fair  development 
Out  of  the  mind-indifferent  physic-fact 
Toward  ever  yet  more  universalness 
Of  implication,  whilst,  within  the  growth, 
Grows  and  keeps  pace  the  person  —  that  our  passion 
And  faith-enthusiasm  shall  nowise  fade 
Into  mere  law-sublation,  more  than  shall  law 
Resolve  itself  to  ignorant  caprice  : 
Were  such  the  reconciliation  'twixt 
Their  faith,  my  knowledge :  then  philosophy 
Were  some  religion,  and  the  crudest  creed 
Incident  to  truth-involution  !   Such 
An  universe  of  growth  (here  speaks  again 
The  exhaustless  Aristotle !)  would  incite 
A  truth  of  passion  and  a  faith  of  law 
In  the  perpetual  striving  whereof  each, 
128 


AVERROES 

As  each  is  in  degree  sane  and  aware, 
Intendeth  truth,  believeth  in  a  law, 
Impassionate  and  saving,  none  the  less 
Provable  universal  and  in  God, 
By  dint  of  yearning,  ever  satisfied 
Without  creation  by  a  cause  beyond 
Nor  ultimate  absorption  in  the  Goal ; 
But  as  from  first  eternal  endlessly  ! 
Thus  were  such  world  (of  them  and  me  at  odds) 
Nevertheless  one  single  systeming 
(Whereby  my  system  were  for  them  not  false 
But  merely  as  more-than-true  beyond  their  souls) 
Of  truth  according  to  the  Stagirite. 
For  in  the  physic-fact  original 
Lay  bedded  a  conatus  which  within 
Almansor  or  myself,  Ibn  Roshd,  alike 
By  satisfaction-seeking  is  the  truth, 
The  law,  the  unity  of  intellect 
(Self's  implication  of  the  souls  of  all) 
And  Godship  to  the  humblest :  all  alike 
By  yearning  Godward,  thus  themselves  the  God 
Operant  through  the  stuff  primordial 
Of  individuation !   Though  I  need 
Myself  no  God  beyond  such  operance 
129 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

(Still  less,  the  mere  moon-motive  put  between 

Heaven  and  earth,  the  Godhead  and  the  Man  !), 

May  he,  the  Caliph  or  the  questioner, 

Require  Mohammed  and  some  aether-throne 

Without  belying  Godhood  in  himself, 

Without  disjunction  from  philosophy. 

And  therefore  may  their  crude  religious  cult 

(Achieving  ample  rectitude  for  them) 

Be  humanly  considerable  within 

My  teaching  learn'd  now  of  the  Stagirite !  — 

Never  will  I  retract.   But  yet  my  truth 
Comporteth  with  a  fair  acknowledgment 
(In  this  so  late-won  world-enthusiasm) 
Even  of  a  truth  which  by  interpretance 
1  predicate  as  sure  achievement  of 
Their  seeming  ignorance.    And  I  may  well 
(Should  persecution  finally  compel  it !) 
Avow  their  Prophet,  and  be  saved  thereby 
From  shameful  death,  but  sully  not  my  soul ! 
Haply,  and  teach  afresh  this  more-than-truth 
Unto  their  want-of -truth  ;  and  lead  them  on, 
By  means  of  mere  religion,  Godwardly  ! 


130 


AQUINAS 

THE  flesh  indeed  is  weary,  though  command 

Of  Pope  unto  the  Council  calleth  me. 

This  bulk  indeed  is  weary  ;  yet  the  spirit 

Must  acquiesce  though  death  itself  ensue 

Of  the  arduous  journey.  Whence,  expecting  death 

(Though  fearing  not  the  least,  and  only  sad 

That  God  through  Pope  and  Council  doth  demand 

Cessation  of  my  labors  ere  the  Sum 

Of  all  Theology  be  tabulate), 

May  I  one  last  redaction  make  in  mind 

Of  my  vast  effort  in  the  name  of  Faith 

Which  Reason  warrants,  this  my  ponderous  work 

Which  open  lies  before  me.   For  the  spirit 

Hath  strength  still  and  desire  to  speak  the  truth 

Best,  perfected,  ere  all  my  speech  be  done.  — 

Of  God,  of  Man,  and  of  the  God-in-Man, 

The  Summa  Theologize,  the  whole 

Of  human  wisdom  or  the  best  of  it, 

Quintessence,  at  the  worst,  of  every  truth  ! 

The  Summa  Theologies,  man's  Reason 

At  service  of  the  Faith,  man's  Faith  directing 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

The  operation  of  a  logic-law. 
For,  as  the  God  is  other  than  His  world 
Whilst  yet  its  Cause  Efficient ;  whilst  the  world 
Is  otherwise  than  God,  yet  work  of  Him 
And  God-appetitive  :  so  yet  our  Reason 
Hath  appetite  of  Faith ;  and  Faith  is  cause 
Of  all  our  proof's  discourse.    No  skill  can  prove 
To  Reason-satisfaction  aught  of  truth 
Without  Faith ;  nought  of  Faith  can  be  conceived 
Save  as  by  process  of  the  intellect : 
Even  as,  within  the  province  of  our  thought 
Are  universals  individuated 
By  fact-material  within  the  form 
Specific-spiritual ;  the  genera, 
Although  to  human  mind  unthinkable 
Save  individuate,  none  less  by  law 
Of  spiritual  entity  believed 
To  be  angelic,  emanate  of  God, 
And  from  within  dominant  of  our  dreams 
Of  personal  independence,  by  control 
Of  the  mere  body;  our  spiritual  part— 
Without  all  person  as  we  know  of  person 
Within  the  world  —  by  grace  nevertheless 
Of  God's  predestinance  (misunderstood 
132 


AQUINAS 

And  not  intelligible  save  to  Faith) 

Destined  to  individuance  supreme 

Whilst  death  destroys  our  individual. 

Even  thus  doth  Reason  (by  our  intellect) 

Prove  of  its  own  known  insufficiency 

The  final  perfecting  achieved  by  Faith 

In  high  theology.   And  here  the  Sum 

Of  all  Theology  would  stand  portray'd 

With  scheme  of  God  and  Man  and,  for  the  last 

And  best  (to  reconcile  the  miracle), 

The  God-in-Man,  the  Christ  upon  our  earth, 

God's  intermediary  and  the  world's, 

Angel  within  the  body,  guardian 

Of  the  truths  unthinkable  preserved  for  men 

Till  death  release  and  open  eyes  of  Faith 

To  comprehend  as  now  we  dimly  feel : 

Christ,  the  true  demiurge,  the  compromise 

And  come-between,  required  of  our  mind 

For  comprehension  of  the  worldliness 

Of  God  or  Godliness  within  the  world : 

Our  intellect's  salvation,  Reasoning  Faith  ! 

Yet  (might  a  mere  man  dare  transgress  the  bounds 
Of  Reason's  finitude,  and,  trespassing 
133 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

On  Faith,  without  Faith  dare  envisage  truth 
As  Christ  may,  and  pronounce  of  right  or  wrong 
By  logical  insistence  on  the  ways 
Of  premise  and  conclusion  !)  how  might  he 
(Such  heretic  blasphemer !)  dream  a  scheme 
Unlike  the  true  scheme  of  our  Reason-Faith 
Yet  sprung  of  Faith-in-Reason,  making  world 
Some  God-in-Man,  as  even  now  is  Christ 
Best  explanation  of  the  world  He  saves  ? 
I  tremble  at  the  subtlety,  ashamed 
At  such  temptation.   Yet  some  power  within 
Impels  me  and  allures  to  try  with  test 
Of  intellect  alone  the  things  of  Faith 
In  shame-faced  half-apology  to  God 
(As  Jesus  Christ  without  apology 
In  terms  of  intellect  might  prove  the  Faith 
Some  merely  natural  Reason  of  Himself!) 
Prying  into  the  mysteries  conceaPd  — 
For  all  that  Revelation  we  conceive !  — 
Of  spiritual  being.  Will  not  God 
Forgive,  nor  Aristotle  disapprove 
One  who  but  keenly  as  the  Stagirite 
(With  Reason  sanctified  in  Christ,  for  Faith  !) 
Searcheth  the  Revelation,  as  the  Greek 
134 


AQUINAS 

Search 'd  but  the  natural  knowledge  of  the  soul  ? 
Will  God  forgive  a  Stagirite  in  Christ 
Whose  Reason,  waiving  Faith,  is  more  than  Faith  ? 
And  must  not  any  search  conclude  at  last 
In  Christ ;  and  need  the  Christian  be  afraid  ? 
But,  ha  !  were  not  the  Reason's  stumbling-block 
And  Faith-compulsion  just  this  fact  of  Christ 
Supposed  the  mediary  demiurge 
Partaking  of  both  natures,  God  and  Man  ? 
Himself  the  intercessionary  aid 
In  that  dilemma  of  the  infinite 
At  touch  with  finite  :  God,  cause  of  a  world  ? 
Yet,  with  the  goal  of  logic-in-the-Faith 
So  clear  before  me,  let  me  logically 
Without  recourse  to  Faith  prove  both  of  God 
And  Man  that  sans  Christ's  intermediacy 
Were  neither  God  nor  Man  as  God  and  Man 
Must  be  conceived  unto  our  intellect 
If  they  be  verily  truth-known  at  all 
For  finite-infinite  as  Christ  is  known. 
Though  yet,  what  revolution  in  the  ways 
Of  premise  and  conclusion,  of  our  proof 
Itself,  if  so  be  Christ  be  provable 
Unto  our  Reason,  as  without  a  Faith, 
135 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

For  actual  truth  of  body,  both,  and  soul ! 

What  alteration  of  the  scheme  of  truths 

Divine  or  human,  as  the  human  soul 

Might  comprehend  the  intercession  new  ! 

But  shows  not  Christ  supremely  thinkable 

(Example  of  the  perfect  natural  life 

Of  Man  in  the  world  at  unison  with  God  — 

If  sinful  none,  yet  humanly  as  finite  !) 

Without  resort  to  Faith  in  any  kind  : 

Himself  that  very  form-material, 

That  spiritual-body,  genus-fact 

Of  individual  specific  still 

Because  divine,  personal  yet  and  owning 

A  world  relational  of  membership 

Whereof  the  Christ-identity  in  flesh 

Were  finite  member,  but  which  as  a  world 

Were  nought  than  Christ's  inferr'd  pragmatical 

Being,  as  Christ  is  conscious  of  the  whole 

Within  His  sympathy,  and  died  therefor  ? 

What  ultimate  Reason,  shorn  indeed  of  Faith 

Yet  needing  none  ;  solving  antinomy 

Of  finite-infinite  (scarce  by  pantheism, 

But  by  pan-Christhood  !),  of  God  and  the  world 

Which  otherwise  were  noway  reconciled  ; 

136 


AQUINAS 

Solving  the  mystery  not  as  I  deem'd 
Through  mediation  merely  — which  would  yield 
But  duplication  of  the  paradox 
Of  infinite  from  finite  still  demark'd 
Within  Christ's  person  and  none  less  within 
Relation  of  the  God  or  world  to  Him  — 
Not  merely  by  intrusion  as  between 
Two  partialities,  but  by  conclusion 
Of  both,  sublate,  in  Christhood  ;  so,  by  proving 
Christ-intermediary  but  a  name 
For  God  or  world  rightfully  understood, 
Self-comprehended  by  the  all-seeing  soul 
Of  Faith-transcendent  logic :  how  no  world 
Might  be,  save  if  in  every  membership 
Infinitely  completed  and  inferr'd 
Interminably  through  all  membership 
From  each  self-focus  personal  of  truth ; 
And  therefore  in  each  membership  divine, 
Howe'er  by  postulate's  hypothesis 
Also  all-human  and  a  work-created 
Indeed  !    How  no  God  (spare  the  blasphemy  !) 
Might  be,  save  personal  and  therefore  part 
Of  His  own  handiwork,  explaining  it 
As  He  is  self-explain'd  in  terms  of  truth 
137 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Worldwise,  and  known  in  every  truth  as  Christ ! 

Thus  far,  for  Reason  working  without  Faith 

Unto  expression  of  an  hyper-Faith 

By  logic :  no  mere  exclusion,  yea  and  nay, 

Which  by  the  choice  'twixt  two  coordinates 

(Truth  and  untruth  !)  by  severating  them 

Selectionwise  obliterates  to  nought 

Even  the  supposed  distinction  ;  but  a  proof 

Conclusive  of  each  part  as  also  whole 

By  differential  inference,  by  oneness 

In  virtue  of  an  incoodination 

Final,  nowise  selective  inter  se 

To  indetermination,  but  distinctly 

This  and  all  others,  positive-negative 

United,  infinite  and  finite  both  ; 

Christ  only  !  —  world  and  God  alike  but  name 

For  truth's  two  aspects  ;  intermediation 

In  propria  persona,  God-and-Man : 

Who  neither,  save  in  Christ,  were  Man  or  God, 

World  or  Creator ;  but  in  Christ  are  so  ! 

Lo !  by  the  Faithless  logic  stands  approved 
The  very  mystery  which  Faith  alone 
Can  but  propound,  which  Reason  led  by  Faith 
138 


AQUINAS 

Can  but  pronounce  by  miracle  achieved 
And  best  accepted  without  questioning ; 
Yet  which  the  Reason,  freed  of  fear  for  Faith, 
Proudly  elaborates  to  perfect  proof 
And  solvent-satisfaction  !   How  might  I 
Justify  then  the  angelologism 
Of  demiurge  interpolate  between 
A  God  and  world,  a  sheer  Faith  and  a  Reason, 
A  genus  and  an  individual ; 
When  in  fair  truth  are  God  and  Man  alike, 
World  or  the  World-Creator,  person  or 
Species,  incomprehensible  save  as 
Themselves  the  demiurge,  t(ie  God-in-Man, 
The  genus-individual,  the  person 
Yet  comprehensive  of  a  fact  without 
Which  scarce  were  fact  save  as  we  reason  of  it, 
Which  scarce  were  truth  save  for  the  soul  that  sees  ? 
How  justify  the  Christ  calPd  mystery 
(All  being  but  Christ  in  that  we  reason  of  Him, 
And  thereby  in  persona  mediate 
Ourselves  'twixt  any  God  or  world  whate'er  — 
Which  were  not  severally  God  nor  world  !) 
Save  on  assumption  of  a  God,  a  world 
Separate  and  irreconcilable 
139 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

By  any  Christhood  — •  as  my  proof  hath  shown  ?  — 
Alas  !  for  this  my  Theologice 
Summa !  I  may  not  work  upon  it  more 
Until  the  Faith  return  in  which  I  wrought 
Blindly  perchance,  but  reverently  far 
Beyond  this  mood  of  Reason-frowardness 
Wherein  this  hour  hath  moved  me  to  blaspheme ! 
Alas  !  for  this  mine  undertaking  !   Christ, 
Canst  Thou  allow  that  any  truth  of  Thee 
Shall  come  to  nought,  that  any  labor'd  love 
Of  God,  felt  humbly  as  the  child  might  feel 
God's  inspiration,  shall  in  blasphemy 
End  and  be  self-destroy'd  ?    Perchance  mankind 
May  take  the  labor  and  the  law  of  Faith, 
The  love-humility,  and  let  it  lie 
For  proof  of  inspiration  —  nor  perceive 
The  rational  induction  as  from  Christ 
His  comprehension  and  example  shown 
Self-cogitant  beyond  all  mystery 
(Impertinence  unfit  for  merely  man  !) ; 
The  logic-inference  of  Faith-less  lore, 
This  hour  hath  shown  me  ?   There  the  Summa  lies 
Unfmish'd,  never  from  my  hand  and  heart 
To  receive  sentence  more  ;  for  fear  my  fall 
140 


AQUINAS 

May  self -betray  upon  the  patient  page 
The  intellect's  rebellion  unawares  ! 
There  the  work  lies.   And  I  must  undertake 
My  journey  to  the  Council  to  defend 
Our  Christianity  ;  though  heresy 
Gnaw  at  mine  heart,  and  fain  would  I  be  dead 
Liefer  than  bear  dispute  where  soul  herself 
Hath  died  down  unto  embers  with  the  weak'ning 
Of  my  vast  body  strangely  sick  to  death. 
Rather  a  death  upon  the  arduous  road, 
Though  sick  at  soul  beside  and  self-despairing 
Of  any  absolution,  than  blaspheme 
In  folly  of  dispute  where  no  belief 
Gives  basis  to  the  assertion.   Fondly,  Lord  ! 
I  pray  Thee,  bless  this  journey  with  release 
By  death ;  that,  ere  the  Council,  shall  mine  eyes 
Of  Faith  re-open,  and  my  blasphemy 
End  with  some  resurrection  !   E'en  though  flame 
Of  Hell  receive  my  spirit,  yet,  O  Lord  ! 
Compel  not  to  the  public  sacrilege 
Of  double-tongued  dispute  !   My  Summa  lies 
A  monument  at  least  of  piety, 
An  edification  to  the  centuries. 
Grant,  in  the  name  of  this,  release  by  death  ! 
141 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Grant  for  the  sake  of  labor  wrought  in  love 
That  no  exposure  ruin  that  I  writ 
In  humble  service  of  Thy  mystery, 
But  which  in  weakness  of  my  body  now 
To  blasphemy  have  secretly  betray'd  ! 


142 


LUTHER 

A  MIGHTY  stronghold  is  our  Lord  of  Hosts, 
A  refuge  and  a  very  present  help 
In  time  of  trouble.  — Were  this  Wartburg  sure 
Without  God's  guardance  and  my  trust  in  Him  ? 
God  guardeth  best  those  that  have  trust  in  Him. 

God's  guardianship  by  this  my  trust  in  Him  ! 
These  move  the  world  anew,  these  shake  the  towers 
Of  thousand  Wartburgs  that  have  not  my  faith. 
The  fabrics  of  the  works  of  many  men 
Burst  unto  dust  but  by  my  living  faith. 
Saint  Thomas  and  the  Schools,  bishop  and  Pope 
Blind  to  the  beauty  of  sweet  Augustine, 
Awake  at  the  word  of  one  poor  recreant  priest 
Teutonic,  ay,  titanic  by  a  faith. 
!  I  can  no  more.  God  help  me.1  —  And  in  that 
Word's  intimate  reliance  came  the  light, 
The  truth's  assurance.   And  I  turn'd  and  stepp'd 
A  little  from  them  into  God's  sunshine 
And  Germany's  free  country ;  and  am  free, 
Free  of  the  spirit  limitless  in  God, 
Though  of  my  body  and  my  body's  works 
143 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Incarcerated  by  a  patron's  care 

Lest  harm  befall.  I  cheerfully  allow 

The  imprisonment  that  so  the  soul  stay  free  ; 

Concealment,  that  the  world  through  me  may 

know 
God's  wonderworking  by  faith's  grace  alone  ! 

Doubtless  the  way  of  man  is  daily  work. 
God's  grace  vouchsafeth  not  where  gluttony, 
The  battening  of  lone  convented  folk 
Burdens  the  laboring  brethren  of  the  field 
Or  sweating  city  or  the  mining-pit 
To  the  support  of  idle  sluts  and  drones. 
Doubtless  the  way  is  work,  as  I  shall  show 
By  fair  example  set  in  God's  good  time, 
Laboring,  wedding,  fathering  stalwart  sons 
And  daughters  to  be  ministers  of  God 
In  the  world  and  vessels  of  His  faith  and  grace. 
Surely  the  way  is  work,  mistake  me  not, 
Ye  future  freely  working  humankind, 
For  any  apostle  of  an  idleness ! 
Yet  are  the  works  of  man  but  vanity 
By  sin  original,  the  ways  of  man 
A  mockery  against  the  ways  of  God, 
144 


LUTHER 

Save  faith  transcend  the  paltry  falling-short, 

Trust  in  the  universal  rule  of  truth 

(Truth,  valent  but  by  belief  the  all-powerful !) 

Absolve  the  error,  and  our  penitence 

Be  perfect  triumph,  not  by  merit  earn'd 

Of  scourge  and  penance,  but  by  assurance,  through 

Christ's  intercession  and  the  heart  of  God 

(That  intercession  and  that  heart  within  me) 

Compassionate  of  His  lost  handiwork, 

Assurance  of  salvation  unto  those 

Who  wholly  love  and  suffer  —  and  are  glad. 

For  thus  is  penance  privately  entail'd, 

A  contriteness  of  spirit,  a  pact  between 

The  soul  and  God,  man's  proper  stand  of  soul 

In  the  presence  compassionate  though  awful  yet 

Of  Him  his  maker :  not  a  rule  imposed 

Extrinsic  of  interpretance  by  phrase 

Of  Peter  or  the  Pope's  usurping  screed. 

The  Bull  of  Pope's-indulgence  were  as  nought ; 

The  strict  monastic  discipline  no  source 

Of  purification,  save  the  church-within, 

The  cloister  of  confession  in  the  heart, 

Impose  the  ordinance,  to  show  all  men 

The  power  in  grace  that  trust  hath  o'er  the  soul. 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

God's  guardianship  is  but  my  trust  in  Him, 
The  power  in  grace  that  faith  hath  o'er  the  soul ! 

Nay,  do  I  hear  detractors  who  exclaim : 
'  A  thousand  churches  for  a  thousand  men 
'  This  Martin  fain  would  build  :  no  Church  at  all 

*  Compelling,  overruling,  yielding  peace 
'  By  questionless  authority  —  a  man, 

1  This  Luther,  who  would  substitute  for  God 

*  On  earth  in  the  Church  the  passion-rule  of  self, 
4  Discord  and  chaos  come  again.'   How  now  ? 

I  answer :  '  Where  the  way  of  each  is  right 
'  In  personal  cognizance  of  the  voice  of  God 

*  Can  come  but  concord,  an  accord  of  each 

'  In  his  mere  time  and  place  with  timeless,  whole 
'  Ordinance  and  establishment  beyond 

*  The  petty  understanding  of  the  mind  ! ' 

(Ah  !  dared  I  say :  '  Yet  human  none  the  less, 
'  Yet  temporal  in  mine  eternal  soul ' !)  — 
Thus  will  a  Church  arise,  not  consecrate 
To  scarce-disguised  idolatries,  not  back'd 
By  fiction,  legends  of  a  spirit-world 
Man  scarce  hath  seen,  and  lived  ;  but  ordered  in 
Community  of  purpose  to  oppose 
146 


LUTHER 

Presumption,  blasphemous  assumption  of 

God's  office  on  the  part  of  any  man 

Over  his  fellows,  each  of  whom  by  grace 

Of  faith  is  godly  (and  no  God  beside 

In  the  world  save  operant  as  healing  faith)  — 

Community  of  protest  to  be  free 

And  worship,  each  communicant,  by  joy 

Of  the  inward  light,  howe'er  it  come  to  him, 

Perfervid,  wholesome,  stalwart,  practical 

Through  the  world  of  God  which  is  the  world  of  men 

And  women,  vessels  of  His  faith  and  grace. 

O  bountiful  earth-nature  !  Field  and  sky, 
Clouds  and  the  forest-clouds  upon  the  face 
Of  the  field  as  heaven  !   O  toilers  in  my  sight, 
Women  and  men  providing,  from  the  field 
And  forest,  sustenance  to  rear  your  young, 
Sinews  of  faith  and  grace  !   O,  hear  ye  me  !  — 
This  Wartburg  falleth  as  the  works  of  men 
Must  ever  fall.  Yet,  firm  by  providence 
Of  Him  who  made  me,  by  zeal  of  him  who  put  me 
A  prisoner  here  assured  for  safer  times  — 
Nay,  through  my  faith !  —  this  Wartburg  still  shall 
stand 

147 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

When  all  save  God  and  soul  are  pass'd  away  : 
A  stronghold  by  the  guardance  of  our  God  — 
By  faith  of  the  spirit  —  symbol  on  earth  of  God 
Stronghold ;  high  Refuge ;  very  Present  Help  ! 


148 


LOYOLA 

AY,  ad  major  em  Dei  gloriam, 
His  splendor  in  the  world  as  evidenced 
In  Peter's  power  through  the  See  of  Rome, 
And  in  preferment  of  this  Company, 
Mine  Order  and  myself  creator  of  it ! 
Unto  that  end  all  means  are  profitable 
And  righteous  whatsoever,  if  the  end 
But  best  be  served  :  a  logic  practical, 
An  ethic  Macchiavellian  (Christ  save 
Its  pagan  perpetrator!),  sane,  self -proved. 
And  to  that  end  is  much  self-evident 
Of  ways  and  method  organizing  men  : 
All  to  be  builded  of  obedience, 
Blind  substitution  of  command  for  cause, 
Discipline  overruling  reason  ;  yea, 
Conscience  obliterate  in  servitude  ?  — 
Amen  !   Were  any  conscience  other  than 
Acknowledged  servitude  to  rules  of  right  ? 
Might  any  rules  of  right  stand  more  confirm'd, 
Establish'd  beyond  peradventure,  than 
Decretals  of  the  very  Vicar  of  Christ 
(Christ  but  the  Vicar  of  God),  and  thus  through  him 
149 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Orders,  commands  of  each  superior 
From  General  down  to  novitiate  — 
Straight  substitute  for  God  where  otherwise 
Were  little  leading  and  no  feeblest  light  — 
As  evidence  Hussites  and  Lutherans  ? 

Thus  I  establish  it :  obedience 
In  furth'rance  of  the  greater  glory  of  God 
On  earth,  obedience  without  any  let 
Nor  hindrance  of  conviction  personal 
Beyond  conviction  that  to  serve  is  right. 
Thus  I  establish  it  to  high  and  low 
Of  the  Company —  yet  what  of  mine  own  self  ? 
What  of  the  least  of  them,  stood  he  as  I 
Commanding,  without  book  to  bind  behest, 
Freely,  dependent  upon  God  alone 
Who  speaks  not  plainly,  leads  by  little  light 
And  suffers  interpretance  equivocal  ? 
Am  I  obedient,  or  were  such  an  one, 
Below  me,  but  obedient  who  stood 
Suddenly  faced  of  some  fresh  circumstance 
Not  fair  foreseen,  not  pre-provided  for  ? 
Can  conscience  (and  originality 
Be  requisite  !)  be,  after  all,  the  source 
150 


LOYOLA 

Of  truth  and  best  for  service  even  of  God  ? 

For,  lo!  if  every  means  be  justified 

That  leadeth  to  God's  end,  what  surety 

Save  conscience  can  convince  (my  case  at  least) 

Of  purity  of  purpose,  'propriateness 

Of  circumstance  and  accident  unto 

The  goal  and  substance  —  what  but  reasoning  faith 

(Not  blind  obedience  !)  can  assure  the  soul 

Of  justification  unto  any  end, 

Of  true  fulfilment  of  the  perfect  plan 

Itself:  major  em  Dei  gloriam? — 

Lay  I  not  sick  in  anguish  many  days, 

A  warrior  not  yet  dedicate  to  God, 

But  fill'd  of  the  fume  of  the  camp,  and  ignorant 

In  every  line  of  learning ;  when  upon  me 

There  came  a  call  of  conscience,  not  of  man, 

And  bade  me  unto  vigils  and  the  oath 

Of  Mary :  that  chastity  and  poverty 

Which  hath  been  in  my  case  sufficient  to 

The  saintly  life  —  beyond  obedience  ? 

Have  I  not  many  years  by  diligent  zeal 

As  student  late  in  life  amass'd  in  mind 

The  myriad  lore  of  universities, 

Making  myself  as  teacher  unto  men, 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Inditing  with  a  wisdom  sorely  earn'd 
The  spirit-regimen  that  makes  of  man 
(By  vigil,  apparition,  visual  trance) 
Best  devotee,  most  valued  proselyte 
Of  the  Order,  Fellow  of  my  Company  ? 
And  hath  this  life-career  been  otherwise 
Than  instigate  of  conscience  thoroughly 
Without  obedience  to  any  man, 
But  rather  in  face  of  all  authorities 
Compelling  even  Pope  and  Holy  See 
To  slow  acceptance  of  the  proffer'd  help, 
Reluctant  permit  to  be  serviceable  ? 
Thus  have  I  wrought,  without  obedience, 
Better  than  had  I  been  obedient 
To  any  call  my  conscience  disapproved  : 
Conscience,  that  sense  of  universal  right, 
Of  God,  within  the  individual  soul ! 
And  am  I  otherwise  than  other  men  ? 

With  that  interrogation  stands  or  falls 
The  Company  of  Jesus.  It  must  stand  !  — 
I,  then,  am  otherwise  than  other  men, 
Not  subject  to  the  law  I  needs  impose 
On  other  men  unto  the  glory  of  God. 
152 


LOYOLA 

Unique  am  I ;  to  other  men,  as  God 
To  me ;  as  soul  to  body  (no  Pope  himself  — 
Elective,  not  soul-chosen  —  were  as  I 
Christ's  representative!);  and  men  must  be 
Obedient  to  my  precepts  to  serve  Christ 
And  me  who  serve  best  Christ  by  ruling  them. 
All  were  as  Hussites  and  as  Lutherans 
Alike  who  lack'd  this  special  light  of  law 
Which,  emanate  from  God  within  my  soul, 
Is  conscience  within  me,  but  unto  them 
Command  imperative.  The  vow  shall  stand 
A  sign  unto  the  ages ;  servitude 
Made  glorious:  questionless  obedience 
Even  unto  death  and  sin  —  the  sin  absolved 
By  my  transcendence  who  pronounce  all  sin 
Committed  by  command  but  righteousness, 
Upbuilding  this  our  Company,  upholding 
The  See  of  Rome  to  greater  glory  of  God. 
So  let  the  justification  be  by  works, 
Corroborative  of  the  theorem. 
Let  results  speak  and  prove  what-means-soe'er 
Appropriate  to  the  end  approved  of  God 
Toward  making  men  wholly  God's  puppetry. 
And  (as  mine  Order  shall  absorb  mankind) 
153 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Myself  shall  be  (in  humblest  reverence, 
I  dare  to  trust)  the  last  and  greatest  Man, 
Creator  of  the  sainthood  militant : 
Myself,  prime  Saint  without  inheritor. 


154 


XAVIER 

THE  Goans  and  the  Cochinese  have  been 
And  poor  pearl-seekers  of  the  Fishing  Coast 
Chiefly  my  field  of  labor  under  God 
Since  first  from  Lisbon  on  these  sapphire  seas 
I  voyaged,  obedient  to  my  General 
Loyola,  loyal  to  the  call  of  Christ. 
Here  of  these  glistening  Indies  hath  my  work 
Prosper'd  and  brought  prosperity  of  soul 
Unto  these  simple  folk,  dark-skinn'd,  soft-voiced, 
Who  needed  only  Christ  and  Christian  faith, 
The  tongue  of  truth  and  leading  unto  God 
To  be  so  easily  heart-taught  and  saved  — 
So  easily  that  some  must  e'en  misconstrue 
My  modest  ministry  for  miracle  ! 
By  hundreds  or  by  thousands  may  I  count 
The  sheep  of  this  new  pasture :  not  enough 
Where  millions,  daily  cowering,  wail  before 
Dark  idols  in  sick-smelling  champak  wreaths 
And  withering  jasmines ;  not  enough  where  bells 
Harsh-jangled  and  the  fume  of  bitter  blood 
From  burnt  flesh-offering,  faugh  !  human  and  beast 
Offend  God's  nostril  and  annoy  His  ear. 
155 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

The  Goans  and  the  Cochinese  in  part 

Or  poor  pearl-seekers  of  the  Fishing  Coast 

I  count  among  Christ's  children.   What  of  those 

Whom  only  want  of  opportunity, 

The  chance  prevention  of  enlightenment 

(For  chance  it  seems,  howe'er  ordain'd  of  God  !), 

Benights  and  dooms  at  death  as  here  on  earth 

Unto  some  Hell  of  dusk  idolatry  ? 

There  are  who  do  entreat  the  dark-of-skin 

As  by  necessity  the  dark-of-soul, 

Forgetful  of  that  ^Ethiopian 

Whom  Philip  did  baptize  ;  and  of  this  proof, 

If  proof  were  needed,  now  of  Malabar. 

Not  so  doth  God  who  sendeth  me  to  save 

Through  grace  of  Christ  the  sinners  dark  of  skin 

Proven  less  dark  of  soul  than  many  a  man 

Cradled  beneath  the  bounty  of  the  Babe  ! 

And  yet  the  grave  perplexity  remains 

Of  ignorance  and  wickedness  foredoom 'd 

In  these  God's  folk-potential  save  for  my 

Fortuitous  advent,  insufficient  zeal 

Which  scarce  sufficeth  for  one  millionth  part 

Of  men's  salvation,  in  these  Indies  now 

156 


XAVIER 

Alive,  and  toucheth  nothing  of  those,  dead 
Since  Christ,  yet  unforewarn'd  of  pains  of  Hell ! 
Doth  God,  though  leading  through  Ignatius'  word 
And  my  obedience,  suffer  yet  His  sheep 
To  wait  the  chance  of  men's  infirmity 
(My  constancy  at  proof ;  my  health,  perchance, 
Subject  to  every  tropical  unease) 
For  soul-salvation  or  eternal  death  ? 
Doth  God  set  man,  myself,  a  task  without 
Limit  or  possibility  wherethrough 
Alone  by  infinite  accomplishment, 
Executance  instantaneous,  might  I 
Acquit  me  worthily,  achieve  in  God 
Aught  adequate  to  human  righteousness  ? 
The  mystery  seems  irresolvable  : 
I,  honestly  devoted,  doom'd  at  best 
To  infinite  dishonor  and  defeat 
For  want  of  some  omnipotence  ;  these  men 
Of  Indies  doom'd,  save  only  two  or  three 
From  many,  to  some  Hell  by  my  default ! 
I  voyage  onward  to  extend  God's  name 
And  Christ's  high  purpose  unto  lands  remote 
And  men  of  hues  uncouth  (Moluccans ;  else 
The  yellow  Mongol  race  ?)  —  to  spread  the  seed 
157 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

No  doubt !  But  what  of  very  voyaging  ? 
What  of  this  gradual  inadequacy, 
This  perishing  of  millions  whilst  I  earn 
The  infinite  saviorhood  for  one  or  two, 
And  for  myself — so  moderate  must  be  men's 
Criterion  !  —  some  crown  of  saintliness  ? 
The  problem  spreads,  inclusive  of  all  ways 
Of  God  with  man,  of  man  within  his  soul : 
The  pitiable  mean  accomplishment  — 
Self-shamed  ;  there  lurks  the  crux  of  this  dismay ! 
For  lack  of  infinite  power ;  and  therethrough 
The  doom  of  innocence  on  every  hand ; 
Doom  of  those  unconverted  and  myself  ; 
Doom  likewise  in  degree  of  every  man. 
The  problem  is  in  brief :  Man,  with  a  soul 
God-like  responsible,  yet  is  not  God  ; 
How  then  be  worthy  of  our  God,  yet  Man  ? 

Behold,  as  in  this  faith-extremity 

I  cast  myself  upon  this  wavering  plank 

Prone  upon  knees  to  pray  —  and  all  the  air 

Is  full  of  inspiration  (and  yon  men, 

The  ship's  swarth  company,  retire  apart 

Leaving  me  space  for  privileged  communion), 

158 


XAVIER 

And  under  me  I  feel  the  heave  of  the  sea 
Interminable,  and  above  my  head 
The  blue  interminable  and  the  clouds 
Ceaselessly  travelling  athwart  the  face 
Of  heaven  —  and  all  is  kind  unto  my  thought 
To  foster,  strengthen,  and  protect  in  faith 
By  influence  beneficent  and  peace 
In  element-performance  under  God  — 
So  under  God  upsurges  in  my  soul 
A  clarity,  a  fair  infinitude 
Of  aspect  and  of  outlook.   Though  I  be 
Inly  foredoom'd,  yet  God  Himself  did  take 
Finitude  thus  upon  Him,  and  in  Christ 
Did  touch  of  men  some  score  in  Galilee 
(And  they  were  fisher-folk  as  these  of  Ind!) 
And  in  Jerusalem,  but  not  in  Rome 
Nor  yet  in  Goa  nor  Negapatam. 
I  voyage  on,  my  very  little  space 
Beyond  the  Christ,  as  Christ  His  little  space 
Travell'd  and  touch'd  upon  the  surging  throng 
But  here  and  there  :  for  all  the  infinite  need  ! 
I  have  learn 'd  God  :  how  God's  mere  infinite 
Were  emptiness,  and  nothing  were  perform 'd 
Were  all  complete  (as  some  sage  Singhalese 
159 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

Themselves  asserted,  following  the  creed 
Of  Prince  Asoka  from  some  antique  time !)  ; 
How  fmitude  entails  accomplishment ; 
And  God  the  infinite  Accomplisher 
Became  of  inmost  self-necessity 
(Nay,  was  from  first,  as  Athanasius  saith) 
Essential  Finitude,  the  Man  of  men  ! 
The  mystery  were  thus  resolvable  : 
That,  God  being  also  fmitude,  so  man, 
In  virtue  of  each  least  accomplishment 
By  will  and  purpose,  effort  to  perform 
Insistent,  conscienced,  were  as  God  Himself 
Christlike  establisher  of  heaven-on-earth, 
Cause  of  infinity.   And,  in  degree 
As  each  feels  failure,  is  infinitude 
In  him  established,  and  through  him  in  all 
Who  hearken  to  his  tale  of  Man  the  Christ. 
And,  for  the  rest,  shall  Christ  not  yet  suffice 
In  some  long  purgatory  by  His  grace 
Not  unbeneficently  to  redeem 
The  dark-of-soul,  whatever  outward  hue 
Their  ignorance  hath  worn  under  the  sun  ?  — 
Some  ignorant  might  well  enough  maintain 
The  fantasy  that  even  without  Christ, 
160 


XAVIER 

Through  their  sad  Gautama  or  Krishna  fierce, 

Each  swarth  idolater  doth  save  himself 

By  faith  in  idol-gods  upon  the  earth 

(Their  faith,  as  mine,  the  test  of  saving  truth  !) 

And  effort  to  live  manfully  by  them  ? 

But  I,  I  value  God  reveal'd,  not  dream'd  : 

Not  I ;  I  voyage  in  the  name  of  Christ ! 


161 


PALESTRINA 

THE  mandate  of  Pope  Pius,  the  decree 
Of  Council,  finally  the  Cardinals, 
Those  eight  commission 'd,  Borromeo  most 
And  Vitellozzi,  pressing  with  appeal 
That  music  in  the  Church  —  surely  a  clear 
High  contrapuntal  canon  of  command  !  — 
That  music  in  the  Church  shall  be  reform 'd 
And  I  reform  it  — by  formality 
Fresh-liberated,  free  of  the  Flemish  mode 
Of  intricate  conceit,  yet  quite  by  rule 
Of  law  newly-devised  with  dignity 
In  place  of  decoration  ;  consecution 
Appropriate  to  expression  of  the  creed 
Or  service,  offertory,  praise,  or  prayer, 
Rather  than  some  profane  inanity 
Of  madrigal  translated,  out  of  point, 
To  vulgarize  the  heavenly  acclaim. 
A  fair  reform  !   Yet  surely  I  have  heard 
Of  one  who,  barbarous  German  renegade, 
Hath  undertaken  to  reform  far  more 
Than  merely  music ;  hath  denied  both  Pope 
162 


PALESTRINA 

And  Council  and  the  holy  Cardinals  ; 
Denied  authority  of  men  o'er  men 
As  intermediate  authorities 
'Twixt  man  and  God  (an  overt  blasphemy 
Decrying  God-establish'd  hierarchies 
Essential  to  religion  and  the  Church  — 
Fault  damnable),  and  so  hath  reft  the  Church 
In  twain  with  his  reforms ;  and  music  too : 
Reduced  to  lawless  maundering,  as  they  say.  — 
A  situation  strange  :  authority 
Demanding  of  mine  art  that  at  the  word 
Of  Pope  or  Council  or  of  Cardinal 
(With  threat  of  abolition  should  she  fail !) 
Music  shall  yield,  and  yield  the  world  a  law; 
Mine  art,  obedient  to  authority, 
Become  authority  as  God  to  man  ! 

At  first  acceptance  (God  forbid  the  fault 
Of  heresy  !)  yet  find  I  in  my  soul 
Somewhat  of  Luther :  keen  to  push  reform  ; 
Whilst  as  creator,  artist  in  mine  heart, 
Indignant  at  the  connoisseur-command  — 
At  the  word  of  ignorance  (placed  ne'er  so  high) 
Demanding  this  or  that  accomplishment 
163 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Out  of  the  spirit  that  should  yield  to  God 
Alone  (not  man  !)  the  satisfaction  of 
Its  innermost  devotion.   I  adore 
Man  Borromeo,  were  he  ne'er  so  saint, 
In  manner  to  award  him  prayer  and  praise 
Out  of  the  fulness  of  a  reverent  soul  ? 
Doth  any  proud  position  in  the  Church 
Give  artist-insight  such  that  at  the  word 
Shall  spring  forth  paean  from  the  barren  brass  ? 
Almost  would  I  too  tear  the  Church  in  twain 
Than  make  my  music  at  a  churchman's  nod  ! 
I  fancy,  too,  those  tunes  of  Martin's  make 
Are  not  so  bad  as  Cardinals  would  claim. 
I  deem  there  must  be  something  said  therein 
Straightforward,  suited  to  solemnity, 
Appropriate  to  a  service  meant  for  God  : 
Perceiving  how  the  man  who  speaks  in  them 
Speaks  as  the  artist-soul  original, 
All-independent  of  the  fear  of  man 
And  making  music  in  the  name  of  God  ! 
Somehow  the  case  is  not  so  wholly  clear 
Despite  that  counter-canon  of  command : 
Whether  it  were  not  best  to  scorn  command 
And  serve  but  God,  well  as  my  will  may  do, 
164 


PALESTRINA 

All-independent  of  the  fear  of  man  ? 
Music  were  made,  at  worst,  for  music's  best 
(And  therefore  best  for  prayer  and  praise  of  God), 
Were  I  to  make  by  impulse  as  I  must 
(Regardless  of  the  Church,  her  proud  demand) 
An  earnest,  genuine,  heart-yearning  song 
Soaring  to  God's  own  throne,  not  lost  athwart 
Their  aisles  and  transepts  of  the  Late  ran. 

An  earnest,  genuine  song,  made  beautiful 
In  all  the  beauties  of  the  sanctuary  — 
The  Church  her  proud  demand,  even  as  mine ! 
Mine  !  for  am  I  the  man,  or  mine  the  mode 
To  be  as  Martin  and  his  homely  psalm  ? 
Am  not  I,  working  at  my  music's  best 
And  quite  regardless  of  the  fear  of  man, 
Yet,  as  spontaneous  creator,  still 
Source  of  an  hierarchy,  in  myself 
Church,  Council,  Cardinal,  and  Pope  ;  my  song 
A  counter-canon  of  authority 
Given,  regiven,  verberant  abroad 
In  firm  reecho  from  the  primal  theme 
(The  primal  God)  reiterant  and  still 
Reiterant  down  through  God's  servitors 
165 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

The  highest,  Pope  and  Cardinals,  and  then 
The  lowlier  dignitaries  to  the  least : 
So  aggrandizing  ever  the  glory  of  God 
By  imitation  to  the  outermost 
Boundaries  of  His  realm  illimitable  ? 
Is  not  the  method  of  the  Church  mine  own, 
And  am  not  I  the  man  who  in  myself 
Sum  up,  express,  pour  forth  (as  Cardinal 
Or  Pope  or  Council  never  may  pour  forth) 
The  spirit  of  Peter,  the  transmission  of 
The  splendor  apostolic,  consecrate 
In  laying  on  of  hands,  crown  upon  crown 
Blessing  the  consecution  of  command  ? 
Such  the  best  freedom,  such  the  late-found 

law 

Reforming  every  old  formality 
By  fresh  insistence  on  the  power  of  God 
In  Holy  Church  her  wondrous  formulae 
Of  intervention,  man  and  man  between 
Each  man  and  God  —  even  the  Pope  supreme 
Only  as  God,  the  Last,  is  over  him  : 
God,  the  God-given  motive  in  my  mind  !  — 
No  more  of  Martin's  music  —  good,  no  doubt, 
For  him ;  but  not  for  me  the  master-hand 
166 


PALESTRINA 

Of  music  apostolic,  laying  on 

My  manumission  of  high  prayer  and  praise. 

This  Borromeo,  Vitellozzi,  Pope 
And  Council,  what  is  it  they  crave  of  me  ? 
A  Mass,  to  be  exemplar  to  the  age 
Of  meaning,  music  made  appropriate 
To  Holy  Church,  her  use  and  services  ? 
I  am  the  man  and  mine  the  mode ;  I  make 
Them  three  —  a  trinity,  for  Cardinals 
And  Pope  and  Council :  representing  God  ! 


167 


AKBAR 

THERE  is  no  God  but  God ;  and  I,  El  Akbar, 

Am  representative  of  God  on  earth 

As  in  the  heavens  the  Sun.    Whence  to  the 

Sun, 

Celestial  Emperor,  lord  paramount 
Of  skies  and  potentate  of  God's  decrees 
As  written  nightly  in  the  further  stars  — 
Whence  to  the  nearest  Word  of  all  God's  words 
Interpretable  of  the  astrologers 
I  daily  make  prostration  :  morn  and  noon, 
Evening  and  at  the  midnight  when  ends  both 
And  re-begins  the  cycle  of  the  skies  : 
Four  times  (a  number  perfect,  as  'tis  form'd 
Of  a  self-birth  in  symmetry  of  cause 
All  ways)  I,  Akbar,  Emperor  of  earth, 
Worshipping  heavenward  as  the  realm  of  earth 
Shall  worship  me  ;  that  through  both  Emperors, 
The  heavenly  as  the  earthly,  shall  the  power 
Of  God  be  heralded  and  manifest, 
Proclaim'd  devotionally  by  the  act 
And  faith  of  every  servant  of  His  name. 
168 


AKBAR 

There  is  no  God  but  God ;  and  I,  El  Akbar, 
Am  God  on  earth  as  in  the  heavens  the  Sun.  - 

'T  is  not  enough  that  God  should  be  on  earth 
As  any  merely  mild  well-temper'd  man, 
Or  any  struggler  by  the  savage  sword 
(As  Jesus  or  Muhammad),  not  enough 
That  He  appear  in  vision,  some  mere  dream 
Of  power  in  contradiction  to  a  fact 
Of  impotence  and  failure  as  of  him 
The  Nazarene,  else  to  some  pettiness 
Of  desert  carnage  and  the  sack  of  towns. 
(My  father,  thus,  the  pitiful  Humayun, 
My  grandsire,  bold  Babar,  conqueror, 
Had  rather  been  the  deity  to  worship, 
Than  I,  consolidator,  self-supreme!) 
'T  is  not  enough  that  God  should  be  on  earth 
Despised,  rejected,  else  held  fearfully 
In  hate  enforced  because  of  spear  and  sword 
Wielded  insatiate.   But  God  must  be 
On  earth  in  majesty  and  reverence, 
In  power  that  is  so  beyond  dispute 
(Mine  obvious  right,  not  any  ancestor's  !) 
That,  being  all-unopposed,  't  is  infinite. 
i69 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

The  wisdom  and  the  clemency  are  mine, 

Made  admirable  but  by  the  power  within 

To  scourge  earth ;  power,  in  mightier  self-restraint ! 

Not  as  Muhammad  who  but  smote  and  slew ; 

Not  as  this  Jesus  of  the  Prankish  monks 

Himself  but  smitten  and  spat  upon  and  slain 

(Not  as  bold  Babar  nor  the  meek  Humayun  !) : 

But  as  the  God,  confirming  the  divine 

In  mine  own  person,  I  may  smite  but  will  not 

Because  I  am  beyond  the  sword  of  man  ! 

Enough  for  Jesus  or  that  Arab  chief ; 

Clods,  of  no  Persian  culture,  Indie  wealth  ; 

No  Jew  despised,  no  lesser-Tamerlane 

Of  wrath  and  unrestraint  can  be  as  God 

Divine  on  earth.   I,  Akbar,  am  divine. 

So  much  for  creeds  of  earth.   Shall  those  of  heaven, 
These  strange  idolatries  of  Hindu  slaves, 
Allure  me  with  their  multitude  of  gods, 
Unless  some  God  be  worthier  than  the  rest, 
Some  symbol  of  their  all-being  provide 
(Mix'd  with  the  meaning  of  the  Magian  cult) 
A  practical  performance  and  a  prayer 
Meet  for  this  teeming  people,  them  whose  toil 
170 


AKBAR 

Is  of  the  field  and  forest,  of  the  rain 
And  shine,  all  sky-dependent  ?    From  the  creed 
Of  that  Muhammad  and  the  Nazarene 
Accept  the  old  Hebraic  unity 
Of  power,  though  not  in  terms  of  them  I  scorn 
As  humanly  inadequate  to  be 
God-like,  but  in  some  nature-sign  to  show 
These  Hindu  vassals  that  divinity 
Which  I  and  those  selected  of  my  court 
Must  seek  and  find  nowhere  than  in  myself  ? 
Let  the  sun  serve,  sith  it  is  known  to  them 
By  long-continued  custom  as  a  god 
(Creator  doubtless  by  some  means  occult 
Of  clouds  and  rains  as  of  the  parched  dust) 
Whereto  their  reverence  doth  naturally 
Direct  their  prayer :  that  I  may  build  upon 
Their  superstition  and  credulity 
A  further  confirmation  of  the  truth 
I  gradually  have  evolved  in  mind : 
My  Godship  in  my  kingship  absolute. — 
The  Zarathushtrians  have  given  excuse 
For  this,  the  Parsis,  fire- worshippers 
Whose  tongue  is  Persian  and  whose  heart  is  pure, 
Whose  priests  are  persons  of  a  liberal  mind 
171 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Fit  to  be  functionaries  of  a  cult 

That  finds  its  patron  in  the  Great  Mogul !  — 

And  lo  !  into  fire  (let  it  but  be  believed) 

Our  souls  shall  alter  at  the  last  decease 

And  wander  in  spirit  as  a  purity 

Through  all  things,  quickening  the  life  of  each. 

A  future  fitter  than  a  paradise, 

A  merit  meeter  than  that  judgment-bar 

Imagined  of  those  occidental  creeds 

Which  cramp  divinity  with  more  and  less 

Of  wrath  or  love  and  leave  the  soul  a  slave ! 

So,  let  the  fire  be  for  an  holy  sign  ; 
And  let  the  arch-priest,  the  sage  and  sweet  Vizir, 
Bring  forth  the  focus-glass  that  fire  may  fall 
From  heaven  upon  the  fuel  here  prepared 
As  sacred  hearth  and  shrine  of  empire. 
And  let  the  courtiers  and  the  people  pay 
Respect  to  each  and  every  lamp  at  night 
In  courtyard  or  in  palace,  and  receive 
Sun  with  obeisance  ;  as  example  shown 
Of  my  prostration  publicly  commands.  — 
Behold  !  in  mosque  or  church  or  fane  alike 
Is  God  but  Akbar  as  He  dwells  on  earth. 
172 


AKBAR 

And  of  this  Akbar  is  the  Sun  in  heaven 
High  representative,  a  Power,  a  Fire, 
Focus  and  unity  of  every  flame, 
Emperor,  Potentate,  all-absolute.  — 
There  is  no  God  but  God ;  and  I,  El  Akbar, 
Am  God  on  earth  as  in  the  heavens  the  Sun, 
Allabu  Akbar  —  meaning :  God  is  Great, 
Akbar  is  God  —  doubly  declaring  both  ! 


173 


SHAKESPEAR 

AH  me  !  mine  own  success  I  cannot  reap  ! 
The  groundlings  flatter ;  and  I  set  me  straight 
To  write  them  just  another  such  a  piece 
As  pleased  —  yet  no  jot  can  my  stint  repeat. 
So  through  these  weary  seasons  hath  it  been 
(Belike  I  jest,  yet  in  mine  own  despite  !)  — 
No  respite  from  a  fond  progression. 
Though  to  deaf  Heaven  I  bootless  cry  to  keep 
My  mind  unmoved,  still  must  I  undo 
All  flattery,  all  praise  obliterate 
With  some  new  strange  experiment  to  win 
The  general  —  which,  when  their  ear  is  won, 
E'en  with  its  own  slow-earned  half-success 
Turns  all  attention,  swerves  all  fair  revenue 
From  earlier  sore-snatch 'd  popularity. 
Say  it  be  won,  the  top  of  admiration : 
Othello  hath  no  peer.   Yet,  seek  as  hard 
As  wit  may  work  to  trick  their  wits  again 
With  any  story  of  Boccaccio, 
With  any  old-wife's  winter's  evening's  tale, 
The  manner  alters  and  the  labor 's  lost ; 
Until  the  groundlings  (fickle  as  the  gods, 
174 


SHAKESPEAR 

Yet  favorable  !)  laud  me  the  novelty  — 
And  then  Othello's  occupation  's  gone, 
And  all  is  unwell  though  it  endeth  well ! 
To-morrow  and  to-morrow  and  to-morrow 
(Some  humor  find  I  in  this  high-flown  strain 
Stealing  the  thunder-cloud  of  mine  own  bombast 
To  vent  this  spleen  with,  mocking  so  myself !), 
To-morrow  and  to-morrow  and  to-morrow, 
Each  day  begins  the  business  all  anew  ; 
And  of  the  yesterdays  no  whit  remains 
To  arm  me  against  seas  of  troubles  new-stirr'd 
Betwixt  me  and  the  starvelings  of  the  pit 
With  every  offering  of  a  new- writ  play. 
Ah !  could  I  twice  re-write,  re-vamp  the  old  — 
'T  were  to  be  playwright  then,  if  not  to  be 
Poet :  the  question  —  is  the  play  the  thing  ? 
Would  I  might  borrow  and  lend  e'en  of  myself 
As  of  this  Ariosto.   Fain  would  I  lose 
The  loan  itself  (if  not  these  friends  therewith !), 
Sailing  on  flood  of  tide  in  mine  affairs 
Rough-hew  them  though  I  should.  The  humor  takes  me, 
The  thing's  conceit.     And  yet  't  would  never  do. 
I  am  no  playwright ;  though  the  pit  cry  out 
On  top  of  flattery,  still  I  write  beyond 

175 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Their  moment's  gust,  still  unto  heaven's  gates 
Send  larks  ascending,  still  reap  contumely 
At  every  first-night — till  the  twelfth  night  shines ! 
And  now  am  I  turned  punster,  with  ado 
O'er  nothing  yearning  (ay,  beshrew  my  soul 
For  arrant  knavery  !)  toward  those  comedies 
In  error,  which  ne'er  I  may  make  again, 
Which  paid  so  handsomely  for  house  and  field  ! 
Haply  these  chronicles  of  British  kings 
(I  have  my  share  in),  writ  indifferent  ill 
With  help  of  friends,  may  bring  in  some  revenue 
(So  full  of  sounding  words  and  stirring  deeds !) 
And  keep  the  wife's  pot  boiling  as  the  stew 
On  witches'  heath  ?    But  by  my  forthright  art, 
Ah  me  !   I  cannot  reap  mine  own  success  — 
But  mouth  and  mow  anent  some  mad  old  Lear, 
Some  whoreson  Cleopatra  in  her  cups  ; 
Jesting  at  mine  own  impotence  to  be 
Up  doing  at  my  business  of  the  stage  — 
A  passable  actor,  marry ;  but  a  fool 
Not  fit  to  know  a  failure  at  first-hand  ! 

But  now  more  honorably  with  mine  art  — 
Belike  a  way  Ml  be  found  in  fair  excuse, 


SHAKESPEAR 

Some  proof  of  method  in  this  maddening  shift 
From  profitable  comedy  or  some 
Tragic  impressive  popularity 
To,  ever  subtlier  and  involved  more, 
A  high  romancing  o'er  the  general  — 
This  caviare  I  offer  them  for  meat  ? 
Mayhap  I  have  my  reason  though  my  play 
Hath  none  ?    There  may  be  something  in  this  soul 
Of  honest  Will  the  rhymester,  as  of  Jaques 
In  Arden,  though  his  greenwood  's  London  town, 
That  groweth  all  regardless  of  the  want 
For  reimbursement ;  else,  of  beggary  ? 
To  London  came  I  and  was  one  of  them, 
These  players  and  purveyors  of  bad  verse  — 
Or  worse  ;  to  London  ;  and  have  been  from  first 
A  peer  if  no  small  potentate  among  them, 
Adapting  to  the  method  of  the  time 
(Each  time  serves  for  the  matter  born  in  it !) 
My  daily  converse  or  my  nightly  song 
In  wassail  with  the  rest  —  as  natural. 
Perchance  I  am  two  persons  out  of  tune  ; 
And  this  that  lifts  to  speak  before  the  bar 
Of  wise  examining  within  me  now 
The  nobler  of  the  jangling  ill-match'd  twain  ? 
177 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Then  let  it  speak  and  soothe  to  harmony 

(By  overmastering  of  the  discord  harsh) 

The  music  that  is  melody  indeed, 

Sweet  reasoning  and  understanding  sane  ! 

A  man  that  hath  not  music  —  in  himself 

Is  beggary  though  he  breathe  the  wooing  air 

Of  kingly  palaces  and  crowds  acclaim 

His  pettiest  perfections  !  —  So,  to  Lear ! 

On  with  the  petulant,  pitiful  old  man 

So  unlike  idols  of  our  England's  stage, 

So  lost  a  king,  yet  so  inevitable 

Unto  the  shaping  insight  as  I  labor. 

On,  to  that  infinite  variety 

(Eternity  still  in  her  lips  and  eyes) 

Which  custom  hath  not  staled  nor  withered, 

My  Serpent  of  Old  Nile,  bred  o'  the  sun 

And  slime,  not  of  the  town  !   For  I  obey 

Necessity,  must  tell  Othello's  tale 

(This  fruculence  of  rhythm  in  my  heart), 

Though  he  the  Moor  be  set  at  naught  thereby, 

Nothing  must  I  extenuate  nor  warp 

In  malice — trusting  that  such  stuff  as  dreams 

Are  made  on  must  as  dreams  be  builded  up 

Out  of  the  cloud-capt  high  imaginings 

178 


SHAKESPEAR 

Of  multitudinous  truths  extemporized 

Of  fantasy  looking  before  and  after  — 

The  hues  of  resolution  richlier  blown 

With  every  cast  of  thought.   That  thus  no  whit 

Ought  I  my  stint  of  scripture  to  repeat 

As  playwright  flattering  the  groundlings'  whim, 

To  make  the  angels  weep  ;  but  I,  proud  man, 

Now  manumitted  of  the  fear  of  the  pit, 

Dress'd  in  the  poet's  quick  authority 

Eternalize  my  tongue  !    Not  monuments 

Of  princes  shall  outlive  mine  impotent  rhyme 

That,  dying  with  the  utterance,  lifts  again 

To  grandeur  witless  of  a  withering  !  — 

The  King  hath  e'en  commanded  us  to  play 
That  prurient  trick'd-up  stew  of  Troilus 
Another  time.   I  will  not  play  it  for  him. 
I  've  earn'd  enough  for  competence  without 
More  ribaldry.  —  On  with  this  doomed  Lear ! 


179 


DESCARTES 

Cogito,  ergo  sum!  —  Gassendi  hath 

And  Hobbes,  sour  exile,  none  too  courteously, 

Questioned  the  ultimatum ;  and  the  rest 

Murmur  of  God.   Mine  answers  have  I  sent 

(All  that  I  care  or  dare  say  publicly  !) 

In  satisfaction  to  the  crude  complaints. 

And  yet  myself  I  cannot  satisfy, 

Stirr'd  by  objection  to  subject  my  creed 

To  keener  criticism,  a  scrutiny 

More  penetrating  than  the  best  of  theirs. 

Mine  axiom  stands  invulnerable.   Now 

Let  me  best  be  my  critic,  through  my  faith 

In  that  self-certainty,  allowing  nought 

Contrary  to  that  primal  postulate 

To  mar  the  logic-harmony ;  but  all 

'Soe'er  of  God  or  world,  let  it  remain 

Only  if  consonant  with  final  truth. 

Cogito,  ergo  sum! —  Upon  that  rock 

I  rear  me,  though  the  very  heavens  fall. 

Cogito,  ergo  sum  !  —  The  vortices 
Of  motion  borne  upon  the  stream  of  time 
180 


DESCARTES 

Contain  no  such  criterion  of  truth 
Immediate,  conclusive.   Nay,  nor  God 
(Despite  His  putative  eternity) 
Himself  affords  such  certainty  as  this. 
That  I  have  weakly  yielded  to  the  whim 
Of  flattering  outworn  divinity, 
Allowing  '  truthfulness  of  will  in  God  ' 
To  supplement  the  self-won  principle 
For  guarantee  of  certainty,  but  brings 
Shame  to  my  soul,  confusion  to  my  creed 
In  contrast  to  the  plain  nobility 
Of  that  enunciation  clear,  distinct, 
Which  springs  in  introspection.    '  Cogito '  • 
Therefore  all  truths  'soever  of  my  soul 
Hold  valid  by  inference  of  the  human  fact 
Of  self-identity  immediate. 
And  God,  so  far  as  any  need  inheres 
Of  guarantee  against  an  ultimate  doubt, 
Were  supererogatory  to  my  soul, 
Mere  source  of  ultimate  confusedness. 
Within  mine  intimate  discovery 
Of  doubt-transcending  entity  no  flaw 
Demands  God-resolution.   This  my  soul 
Is  absolute  ;  and,  if  somewise  of  God 
181 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

(As  even  I  were  scarce  prepared  as  yet 
To  contradict),  hath  no  dependency 
By  any  virtue  of  residual  doubt ; 
But  is  itself  final  criterion 
Of  clearness  and  distinctness.   All  without 
The  soul  must  seem  indeed  a  source  confused 
Of  indirection  and  analogy, 
Fit  object  of  the  sweeping  skepticism 
To  which  I  aye  subject  it.   If  within 
Is  certainty,  without  's  but  theory 
Interpretative  of  sensations  scarce 
Distinguishable,  scarce  beyond  the  beasts' 
Referable  to  reason.   And,  for  this, 
Were  God  no  supererogation,  but 
Basic  necessity,  an  warranty 
Be  wanted,  an  the  passions  of  the  sense 
May  anywise  be  clarified,  subdued, 
And  brought  to  order  and  a  systeming. 
God  may  be  Mind  or  no.   His  may  be  mine 
Absolute  insight  of  self-being,  yet 
(As  His  —  as  supplemental  to  the  proof 
Within  —  beyond  first  incidence  of  mine) 
Not  needed,  nowise  indispensable 
To  mine  assurance.   But  without  the  self 
182 


DESCARTES 

Were  chaos,  save  some  ordering  God-will 
Creates,  haply  sustains,  and  orders  all  things 
Contrary  to  deception  and  impels 
The  animal-spirits  correctly  to  report 
Unto  the  soul  in  brain-stuff  situate 
The  manner  of  world-motions ;  which,  save  only 
Mediance  of  the  gland  pineal,  might 
Nowhere  enact  on  thought  an  alterance 
Nor  offer  any  information  through 
Machineries  of  sense.   But  by  God's  will 
(And  only  by  God's  will  miraculous) 
Doth  motion  indicate  upon  the  soul 
Its  indirections,  its  analogies 
Unto  interpretation,  skepticism 
And  theory  approximating  toward, 
But  never  realizing,  certainty 
Beyond  some  dubitation.   Save  for  God, 
Might  the  man-mind  in  vain  essay  an  insight 
Of  worldly  things,  sans  God  beyond  all  reach 
Of  any  knowledge  ;  as  the  motion-world 
Of  space-impulsion  and  of  vortices 
Might  wilder  chaoswise,  and  none  to  heed 
Cosmic  fatuity,  for  all  the  care 
With  which  upon  the  pulses  of  our  brain 
183 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

The  emanations  and  the  corpuscles 
Might  beat  in  vanity.  —  The  vortices 
Contain  no  certainty  like  this  of  self. 
But  God  by  act  miraculous  of  will 
Orders  the  spirits-animal  intervening 
To  cause  infection  of  the  conscious  soul 
And  yield  a  knowledge  where  no  knowledge  is 
By  any  power  of  the  human  will. 
And  thus  were  soul  in  this  its  certainty 
Confined  unto  volition  which  alone 
Is  independent  of  the  world-machine 
And  of  the  intervened  divinity. 
Thus  were  my  will  alone  cause-of-itself 
And  independent  of  a  God  beyond 
Who  may  or  may  not  beformaliter 
Himself  my  will  without  affecting  it 
Nor  causing  derogation  from  the  truth 
Of  certainty  immediate.   But  thought, 
In  so  far  as  affected  by  the  things 
Of  motion  and  emotions  of  the  sense, 
Essentially  dependeth  on  the  act 
Of  God,  and  must  upon  His  truthfulness 
Implicit  place  reliance ;  that,  sans  God, 
Were  all  my  doctrines  of  the  vortices  — 
184 


DESCARTES 

Their  propagance  of  motion  self-conserved  — 

Of  mechanism  and  geometry 

(Which  seem  so  pseudo-clear,  so  false-distinct 

At  least  to  cogitation)  nothing  more 

Than  postulates,  coordinates  in  God 

Of  a  proof,  of  a  curvature  nowise 

Intrinsically  provable.   And  world 

Remains  enigma,  save  our  confidence 

In  God  be  perfect  beyond  skepticism ! 

And  can  the  soul  that  once  hath  known  itself 
In  thought's  immediate  certainty  rest  thus 
In  confidence  upon  a  God  unfelt 
Whose  plausible  coincidence  of  will 
Even  with  mine  own  might  never  operate 
Otherwise  than  my  certainty  of  self 
Permits  unto  the  will  of  God-in-me  ? 
Were  not  the  soul,  that  thus  can  rise  beyond 
Dependence  and  attain  indifference  toward 
The  infinite  will  (such  autovital  self) , 
Superior  to  any  confidence 
Wherein  the  right  of  self-reliance  were 
Lost  and  assurance  credulously  placed 
Upon  the  fiat  of  an  emptiness 
185 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Which  no  heart-introspection  verifies  ? 

Rather,  the  true  report  of  skepticism 

Be  for  a  credo  ;  firm  denial  of  God 

For  faith  :  acceptance  of  uncertainty 

Be  certain,  clear,  distinct  assurance  won  : 

How  nought  in  the  world  stands  proven  as  we 

sense  it ; 

But  all,  if  any  world  beyond  the  soul 
Exist,  may  be  deception  !   Then  at  last, 
However  pitiful  and  valueless, 
Ironical,  a  mockery  might  be 
The  proven  data  of  a  motion-world 
Conceived  as  heterousian  to  thought, 
Yet  in  such  world's  rejection  by  our  thought 
Lurks  nothing  that  may  make  the  soul  ashamed, 
Nothing  wherefrom  our  certainty  may  shrink 
For  fear  of  lie  divine,  contingency 
For  guarantee  ;  but  all  is  open  then 
To  confidence,  reliance  in  a  will 
That  wipes  into  a  nescience  inane 
The  fabled  world  of  fiat !   That  a  world 
(For  some  world  must  be  to  our  questioning) 
Based  in  the  inward  certainty  (for  no 
World  hath  survived  from  self  estranged)  may  rise 
1 86 


DESCARTES 

Germane  unto  the  mind  that  makes  of  it 
Interpretations  of  the  things  of  sense 
Which  are  of  thought's  own  substance  ;  and 

be  seen 

By  warranty  of  faith  immediate 
In  world-construction  (to  our  questioning 
A  fair  response)  for  soul-experience 
Of  soul,  in  virtue  of  the  will-of-self 
Self-differential !   Then  my  Cogito 
Shall  bear  a  meaning  of  a  world-in-me ; 
Mine  Ergo  sum  involve  creation  (as 
A  God)  of  endless  multitudes  of  souls, 
Past  and  to-come  unto  the  end  of  time, 
Holding  in  each  soul,  as  within  my  soul, 
By  godship,  each,  all-time's  criterion 
All-independent  of  eternity. 
Cogito,  ergo  sum ! —  (Gassendi  hath 
His  answer,  and  I  mine)  —  The  vortices 
Shall  stare  amazed  upon  the  Vortex-Soul ! 


187 


SPINOZA 

HOW  marvellous  that  I,  the  mind  minute, 
Of  personage  obscure  and  humble  place, 
Benedict,  outcast  (how  that  Benedict 
Implies  the  wonder !)  at  my  daily  task 
Of  grinding  glasses  unto  optic  aid, 
Should  share  in  God  and,  to  my  least  degree, 
In  finite  represent  His  attributes 
Infinite,  grounds  of  my  modality, 
Extension  both  and  Thought ;  in  that  I  taste 
Both  bodily  and  with  the  spirit-sight 
(As  body  and  thought  are  one  within  my  soul) 
Somewhat  of  His  intention  absolute  — 
For  order,  system,  law  are  God  in  us  — 
Gazing  athwart  these  lowlands  toward  the  sea 
And  sensing  God  the  boundless  in  their  breadth. 
Ay,  every  man  and  every  beast  (therein 
Descartes  was  blind  and  brutal  that  he  placed 
Dumb  brutes  beyond  the  pale  of  soul !),  in  sort 
Each  herb  of  the  field,  if  not  each  smallest  grain 
Of  the  sea's  shifting  sand,  yields  sight  in  least 
Of  that  which  God  is.   For  in  fact  and  thought 
Is  He  each  man,  each  beast,  each  herb  of  the  field, 
1 88 


SPINOZA 

And  every  grain  of  the  sea's  shifting  sand  — 
The  sea  unseen,  whose  murmur,  like  God's  voice 
Within  the  heart,  comes  on  the  distant  air 
Unto  my  window  as  I  work  and  muse 
Of  His  infinity,  the  Far  yet  Here, 
Thought  ev'n  as  Existence.   For  the  great  Descartes 
Was  fair  in  this  :  that  certainty  of  self 
(And  with  it,  as  I  hold,  of  every  fact 
In  anywise  resemblant  of  a  self) 
Felt  in  the  postulate  immediate 
(As  by  analogy  applied  to  all) 
Of  thought,  can  rest  but  in  the  truth  of  God 
His  being  as  His  knowing.    But  beyond 
Descartes  was  this  ;  the  proof  that,  an  God  be 
(As  God  were  absolute  primal  axiom!), 
Must  all  soe'er  in  somewise  be  of  Him 
Parcel  and  aspect,  sharing  as  of  God 
In  thought  and  being,  spirit-truth  or  space. 
For  otherwise  were  God's  infinitude 
Hamper'd,  determined,  and  confined  (so  made 
Nought  infinite)  by  merest  being  of  each 
(For,  e'en  though  finite,  yet  must  entity 
Be  relatively  theirs  in  virtue  of 
Possess 'd  extension,  attribute  of  being  : 
189 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

No  mere  illusion  to  our  thought  that  else 
Were  but  deceived  by  God  whose  law  is  truth  !) 
Were  God  confined  by  very  being  of  each 
The  least  herb  of  the  field,  sand  of  the  sea, 
Or  ear  to  hear  the  murmuring  far  voice 
From  ocean  drifting  with  the  westerwind 
Unto  my  window  over  the  wide  lea. 
Rene  was  right.   But  on  him  must  I  build 
The  explanation  of  our  dualism, 
God's  prime  assumption  of  the  attributes 
Wherein,  as  substantives  by  God  create 
Opposed,  Descartes  divided  yet  the  world 
Nor  reunited  them,  as  needs  should  be, 
(Save  partially,  if  God  and  mind  be  one  ? ) 
In  ultimate  essence  of  the  Substance-God. 
For  God  conceived  he  (as  a  man  might  see 
Some  ocean  over  beyond  a  managed  land) 
For  stuff-of-thought  somewise  intractable, 
Incapable  of  reclamation  still ; 
Maugre  our  dunes  or  dikes  of  argument 
Not  germane  to  the  fact  of  fact-in-space 
But  sheerly  non-extensive  ;  that  there  stood, 
Over  against  the  solid  land  of  men, 
Their  goings  and  their  comings  practicable 
190 


SPINOZA 

(Which  only  as  in  the  brain's  pineal  gland 
Had  touch  of  God  or  unity  with  Him  !), 
The  theory  of  God  within  the  mind  : 
Final  assurance  somewise  (as  the  sea 
Might  seem  to  bound  and  be  for  firmament 
Around  our  continent)  of  me  and  mine, 
This  man  and  that  man  and  their  means  and  ways ; 
But  not,  save  solely  for  that  postulate 
Of  being  through  thought's  certainty  of  self, 
Accountable  for  truth's  duality 
In  either  instance.   For  the  mind  of  God 
(With  Rene,  substantive  not  attribute ; 
Opposed  to  matter  and  not  reconciled 
By  relative  ascription),  why  should  it  think 
(By  indirection  through  the  mind  of  man 
Dreaming  the  dreams  of  space  unwarrantable  !) 
The  thoughts  call'd  mind  of  man ;  and  why  should  man 
Think  thoughts  of  space-extension,  dream  of  things 
Unwarranted  by  spacelessness  of  God, 
And  hence,  if  anywise  themselves  a  truth, 
Of  independent  fundament  ?   Whence  God 
By  postulates  Cartesian  well  might  seem 
A  somewhat  merely  over-against  all 
We  know  of  land  and  sea  and  air  alike ; 

191 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

And  therefore  (lo  !  a  God  remote  and  lorn 
As  ocean  !)  inly  over-against  us  too, 
Whose  stuff-of -thought  (explain'd  as  God  none  less !) 
Is  land  and  sea  and  air,  herb  of  the  field, 
Beast  of  the  pasture,  and  that  distant  sound 
Which  comes  like  voice  out  of  the  infinite 
In  sooth,  whilst  but  some  emanation  from 
The  pulse-beat  of  the  surge  upon  the  sand  — 
Nought  other :  though  it  stir  my  senses  here 
And  with  them  all  my  soul  (my  soul,  but  sense 
Of  world  in  order  of  eternity 
And  therefore  God  in  sort)  to  speak  of  God  ! 
Thus  take  I  great  Descartes.   Were  he  right  wholly 
(And  then  would  he  be  Nature,  God  not  Man !) 
Were  God  yet  very  near  nonentity  ; 
And  nought  were  referable  unto  Him 
Nor  explicable  by  infinity,  . 

Where  His  infinity,  so  false-conceived 
As  mental  substance  sans  space-attribute, 
Were  bounded  by  the  substance  of  our  space, 
Our  world  and  everything  we  think  therein 
So  far  as  built  upon  the  facts  of  sense  ! 
Nor  can  Geulincx,  with  all  his  fear  of  God, 
Effect  a  reconciling,  where  his  God 
192 


SPINOZA 

Must  operate  on  substances  opposed, 
Mind  both  and  body  as  occasion  calls, 
To  harmonize ;  though  neither  is  of  Him 
For  attribute,  and  therefore  both  alike 
Determine  God  as  in  Jehovah's  guise ; 
And  Descartes'  fault  is  doubled.   Nor  can  they 
Of  Britain,  Bacon,  Hobbes,  or  latest  Locke, 
By  reference  of  every  truth  to  sense 
And  thus  at  last  to  motion,  more  than  mean 
That  of  a  God,  an  One,  they  know  nor  care. 
But  of  the  dear  dilemma  doth  a  truth 
Evolve,  how  God,  if  Godlily  He  be, 
Must  owe  both  fundamental  attributes, 
Not  mind  alone,  far  less  this  world  of  space 
Solely,  but  both  alike,  extension  and 
Thought,  if  inverse  of  aspect  both  yet  God's, 
Attributes  wherein  rests  modality.  — 
That  further  problem  of  the  attributes, 
Their  prime  interrelation,  how  they  be 
Wholly  obverse  and  yet  of  God  the  same, 
Without  relation  and  yet  correlate, 
That  problem  leave  I  to  futurity 
Building  upon  me  as  upon  Descartes 
I  build.   My  stint  of  sight  goes  not  so  far, 
193 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

Though  sure  unto  the  limit  of  my  reason  : 
Reason,  sufficient  by  my  sharing  in 
The  truth  of  God,  as  He  is  infinite 
And  finite  I,  but  otherwise  one  truth. 
Nay,  and  that  further  contrast  ultimate 
Of  my  half-finite,  His  infinity 
(This  difficulty  of  our  modalism) 
Seemeth  itself  but  marvel,  not  to  be 
Wholly  explain'd  by  me  the  quasi-finite 
Who  realize,  appropriate  in  mind 
But  may  not  sanely  solve  the  mystery 
None  less  for  marvel  actual  assured  ! 
For  in  the  dual  attribution  springs 
The  form  of  truth  that  yields  me  share  in  God ; 
And  therefore  is  the  marvel  possible 
That  I  the  bigots'  scapegoat,  late  thrust  out 
From  synagogue  and  service  of  my  race 
And  in  this  humble  village  set  to  earn 
A  meagre  livelihood  by  craft  obscure, 
May  ne'ertheless  feel  of  the  infinite 
My  share  for  solace  and  be  stuff  of  God 
Both  as  I  sit  and  see  the  widespread  leas 
Of  this  Low  Country  and,  though  fleshly-born, 
Am  parcel  of  His  plenitude  of  space, 
194 


SPINOZA 

And  as  the  murmur  of  the  distant  sea 
So  faintly  touching  on  the  ear  of  sense 
Speaks  to  the  spirit  and  resolves  my  thought 
To  ratiocinate  of  God  the  Mind, 
Thought-universal :  that  my  meagre  thoughts 
Are  also  God's  :  God  thereby  through  me  proven, 
In  virtue  even  of  my  fmitude, 
Nowise  determined  of  my  fmitude, 
But  postulating  and  approving  it 
In  both  those  ways  diverse  which  great  Descartes 
FaiFd  of  ascribing  equally  to  Him. 
And  thus  the  ultimate  axiom  of  God, 
The  substance  self-appearing  modalwise 
As  self-diverse,  gleams  through  my  daily  task 
Of  grinding  glasses  unto  optic  aid 
(Fit  symbol  of  a  mission  unto  men  !) 
Daily  discern'd,  daily  to  comfort  me 
In  this  affliction,  thrust  beyond  the  pale 
Of  race  and  old  religion.     And  I  plan, 
As  adequately  as  my  share  in  Him 
May  prompt  me  and  permit,  to  set  me  forth 
The  ethical  system  of  the  Modal  God, 
The  substance  and  the  attributes  portray'd, 
The  truths  of  reason  and  the  truths  of  sense, 
195 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Insight  of  ordering  eternity 

To  govern,  regulate  our  daily  ways 

Of  passion  and  affection  —  all  portray 'd 

By  method  of  the  sure  geometer 

From  postulate  and  axiom,  premised  in 

The  truth  of  this  reflection :  whilst  the  sea 

Pours  to  my  ear  attuned,  attentive  now 

The  distant,  small  yet  full  sonority 

Of  mightiness  at  working :  that  my  work, 

Though  emanate  but  from  this  mind  minute, 

May  with  the  breadth  and  fulness  of  the  sea 

Have  power,  and  speak  to  many  among  men 

Of  mightiness  at  working.   Great  Descartes 

Rifted  the  world  in  twain  —  I,  Benedict 

The  poor  world-outcast,  heal  the  rift  —  in  God, 


196 


KANT 

FROM  our  dogmatic  slumbers  surely  we 
Awake,  and  critically  comprehend 
The  compromise  between  opposing  creeds. 
From  our  dogmatic  slumbers  we  awake ! 
God,  freedom,  immortality  abide, 
An  heritage  of  grace  inviolable 
In  virtue  of  the  comprehension,  saved 
Unto  our  personal  practice,  though  at  best 
Lost  from  phenomenal  sufficiency 
Or  any  knowledge.   But  the  faith  remains 
Clear'd  of  confusion  with  the  things  of  sense, 
Space-intuition  or  the  synthesis 
Sprung  a  posteriori.    Prior  to 
All  understanding,  underlying  all 
Of  sensuous  reason,  gleam  intuitive 
To  pure-imagination  (an  the  term 
Mean  thought-beyond-conception  ?)  postulates 
Proved  innerly  ideal,  quite  beyond 
Concatenation  with  experiable 
Truth-presentation.     Undiscursively 
Sub  specie  ceternitatis  spring 
The  truths  beyond  space,  time,  or  very  judgment 
197 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

Self-given,  transcendental :  God,  the  soul ; 
And,  of  the  two  conjoin'd,  freedom  of  deed 
Within  will-conscience  categorical. 
Thus  much  is  sure :  no  mere  analysis 
Of  inborn  intellection  e'er  might  yield 
Experience  ;  no  experience  by  sense, 
Save  apperceptual,  might  formulate 
Truth-relativity  and  functioning. 
Nor,  if  our  knowledge  be,  as  thus  approved, 
Wholly  experiential,  earn'd  of  sense 
For  necessary  substance  apperceived 
Within  the  formal  functions  space  and  time, 
Might  duty,  conscience,  immortality 
Be  saved  unto  the  soul,  nor  God  and  soul 
Experience  themselves,  unless  at  last 
Over  beyond  experience  remain 
The  final  postulates  self- warranted, 
Axiomatic,  whereof  (noumenal 
To  faith  if  to  our  very  reason  blind) 
Are  guidance,  valuation  yielded  to 
All  acts  of  man,  man  moralist  alone 
In  virtue  of  a  Duty,  absolute, 
Unquestionable.   We  indeed  awake 
From  our  dogmatic  slumbers ;  and  are  sure 

198 


KANT 

By  warrant  of  the  sane  evaluation, 

Evaluation  applicable  alike 

To  aught  sensational  or  rational, 

Hypostatized  or  formal,  save  alone 

Those  postulates  exempt,  themselves  beyond 

Concept  of  form  or  substance.   Save  at  least 

For  such  exemption,  seems  the  last  truth  known, 

The  problem  solved.  — Might  any  man  do  more  ? 

And  in  the  conscious-won  achievement  now 

I,  soul-mature,  resign  the  teaching,  take 

Leave  of  my  post  for  leisure  whilst  I  live 

To  recapitulate  to  mine  own  mind 

What  I  have  learn'd  and  taught  before  all  men. 

And  the  truth  seems  as  I  above  declare, 

Displacing  dogmatisms  hitherto 

True  seemingly  and  heretofore  believed. 

Though,  were  it  not  but  dogmatism  disguised 
To  rest  in  any  doctrine  that  would  seem 
Final  truth -satisfaction  ?    May  not  truth 
(Attainable  perchance  by  criticism, 
Yet,  as  attain'd,  formative-critical !) 
Itself  be  process,  truth- belief  at  best 
In  alterance  ever  (I  would  fain  believe 
199 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

No  man  in  error  where  belief  is  frank 
As  in  this  Gottlieb  !    I  would  fain  believe 
My  wisdom  unendanger'd  by  success 
Of  counter-systems  !)  that  the  old  give  place 
To  new  :  as  I  in  leadership  must  now 
Yield  to  the  young-advancing  spirit,  he 
Whom  I  befriended,  yet  before  the  world 
Who  openly  decries  my  creed,  would  fain 
Substitute  for  this  credence  noumenal 
Some  sense  of  selfness  felt  intuitively, 
To  solve  the  riddle  of  antinomies 
As  I  proposed  them,  relegating  form- 
And-substance  (hitherto  my  fundament 
Of  cosmic  explanation)  to  mere  phase 
Of  self-deliverance,  self-utterance 
Of  the  absolute  inherence,  egohood  ? 
My  craft  were  criticism,  judgment  o'er 
The  crabbed  dogmatisms  of  thought  and  sense 
And  so  far  fairly !   Yet  are  those  dogmatisms 
In  my  critique,  as  sadly  I  confess, 
Alike  regarded  as  unreconciled 
For  terms  of  explanation  ultimate 
Unless  in  some  third  function  nowhere  found 
Save  in  a  faith,  pragmatic  postulate 
200 


KANT 

Necessitated  lest  reason  and  sense 
Alike  be  vacuous  and  all  truth  be  lost ; 
Faith  call'd  in  compromise  to  substitute 
For  non-phenomena  unknowable, 
For  spaceless,  timeless  soul-nonentity, 
For  chaos  come  again,  wanting  a  form. 
That  I  've  derived  God,  immortality, 
The  human  soul  from  such  sheer  tour  deforce 
Of  unctio  in  extremis  to  my  creed 
Scarce  may  discredit  this  the  fresh  attempt 
Of  him  who,  postulating  inwardness, 
Egohood  for  the  pure  nooumenon 
(Though  how  such  universal  be  defined 
Unless  as  I  and  thou  as  each  is  man, 
I  know  not  nor  might  readily  conceive  !), 
Assumes  the  derivation  of  a  world 
By  spontaneity,  as  it  would  seem, 
Although  by  opposition  absolute 
From  out  such  selfness.   Shall  I  pale  before 
The  young-ascending  star  without  at  worst 
Some  criticism,  comprehensively 
Some  effort  urgent  of  mine  egohood 
(Of  Egohood  within  the  will  of  me 
Even  as  a  god,  and  yet  God  by  no  means  !  — 
201 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

So  Johann  Gottlieb  teacheth  me  to  mouth) 
Unspent  as  yet  although  eyesight  be  dim 
And  hand's  strength  failing  for  the  record  here  ? 
Shall  I  in  dogmatism  make  descent 
Who  flourish'd  in  a  dogmatism's  fall, 
Or  use  my  last  of  critical  acumen, 
Of  estimate  and  apperception,  toward 
Some  reconstruction  of  the  falling  scheme, 
Some  alteration  of  the  creed,  to  crave 
Attention  from  the  centuries  to-come 
Even  beyond  this  Fichte's  ?    For  I  feel, 
In  my  sad  sense  of  failure  before  him 
Who  would  reclaim  to  our  experience 
Innerly  what  my  teaching  hath  but  proved 
No  presentation  —  in  my  failure  feel  I 
A  principle  of  regenerance,  a  seed 
Perchance  of  proof  will  relegate  his  own 
(Which  seems  indeed  strangely  to  lack  some  real 
Accountability  for  me  and  thee 
As  we  are  facts  of  mine  experience  !) 
To  obsolescence.    Centuries,  may  be, 
Shall  heed  some  fresh  tongue  that  shall  plainly  speak 
What  I  'd  adumbrate  with  my  senile  sense 
And  failing  faculties  which  yet  yield  not 
202 


KANT 

Without  revolt  to  triumph  such  as  his 
Who  was  my  pupil ;  for  the  old  demurs 
At  the  new  prophet  and  would  none  of  him, 
Save  to  refute  him  out  of  his  own  mouth, 
By  full  agreement  fain  outstripping  him 
To  win  the  laurel  in  the  lists  of  truth  !  — 
So  be  it ;  for  this  my  criticism  now 
Of  mine  own  creed  and  system,  radical 
And  fundamental  in  simplicity : 
The  egohood  of  Fichte  (which  would  seem 
Wanting  in  characteristic  ? ) ,  with  mine  own 
Appreciant  return  upon  the  truth 
Within  the  truth  and  constituting  it ; 
Solving  perchance  the  problem  of  a  God-world 
Noumenal,  self-sustaining  as  I  feel  it 
In  process  of  world-truth,  yet  none  the  less 
Experiable  and  phenomenal, 
Formal  and  characteristic  even  in  each 
As  each,  yet  infinite  in  every  soul. 
For  is  not  this  my  soul  some  infinite 
(Not  as  a  world-force  surely  —  but  as  myself!) 
Grasping  the  truth  of  Gottlieb,  as  before 
The  truths  of  predecessors,  by  return 
Upon  itself  ever  elaborating 
203 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Unlimited  criteria  within 

(But  not  beyond  ;  for  nought  might  be  beyond  !) 

The  postulated  process  ?    Therefore,  on 

To  criticism  unused,  whose  verity 

Even  as  some  function  of  my  being  proves 

Capacity  within  my  creed  to  close 

With  views  unwonted,  satisfactory 

Unto  an  intellect  that  knows  itself 

In  the  very  process-critical,  itself 

Highest  example  of  the  problem  now 

To  solve  by  power  of  the  problem's  self. 

For,  on  this  hint  of  Fichte,  I  absolve 
Intellect  from  those  limitations  (deem'd 
Proven  as  limitations)  space  and  time  — 
Its  own  formality.    And  now  declare 
Essential  formalism  (such  even  as  space 
And  time  the  universals)  for  no  proof 
Of  limitation  nor  of  truth  beyond 
Our  powers  of  apprehension  rationally, 
Which  by  their  own  exhaustion  but  exhaust 
Truth  proven  concluded  of  their  formalism 
And  formalist  essentially  as  them. 
Though  all  be  given  in  phenomena 
204 


KANT 

As  an  experience  interminable, 
Yet  just  such  mutualism  essential  yields 
Key  to  the  secret  of  experience, 
Yields  resolution  to  the  antinomy 
Of  such  a  criticism  as  mine  old  creed 
Pronouncing  its  own  impotence  of  proof ! 
For,  lo !  howe'er  our  sense  be  constituted 
Of  universe  external,  if  we  be 
(As  thou  or  I  in  estimating  truth) 
Ourselves  the  judge  of  such  experience, 
Experiencing  but  in  virtue  of 
This  faculty  of  judgment  critical 
(As  mine  old  creed  fairly  establishes), 
Then  is  our  truth  a  figment  in  itself 
(Not  representative  but  original, 
Not  tentatively  but  definitive 
Unto  the  soul  elaborating  it !) 
Of  its  own  mastery  creative,  true 
As  by  processiveness  recomplicant 
Of  the  creator-judgment,  thine  or  mine, 
Inly  assumptive ;  and  (unless  we  be 
Utterly  all-illusive !)  infinite 
Because  interminably  determinative 
Of  its  intrinsic  mutuality 
205 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Of  item  unto  item  constituting 

My  personality  or  thine  alike 

Creative  of  the  world-experience 

Nowise  identical,  yet  identically 

Appreciant,  apperceptive,  absolute 

For  all  world's  sensuous  relativity 

And  imposition  of  the  counter-self  — 

Posited  counter,  scarce  by  force  imposed 

Of  general  conatus  not  one's  own 

But,  by  the  identical  totality 

Of  selfness  equally  inherent  to 

Mine  object-inverse  as  mine  egohood. 

And  to  such  self-world  scheme  were  space  the 

form 

Of  counter-self  supposed  indifferent 
To  alteration ;  and  the  form  of  change 
Time,  as  my  consciousness  alone  hath  motion 
Cumulant,  irretractable,  and  hence 
Essentially  processive  (whether  through 
Objective- world  or  subject),  over  space 
An  alterant  eternity  in  each 
Moment  of  implication  endlessly. 
Where  were  the  need,  to  such  evaluing, 
Of  any  cosmic  essence  putatively 
206 


KANT 

(That  bugbear  thing-itself  beyond  all  ken ! ) 
A  non-objective  independently 
Of  formalism  in  this  my  space  and  time  ? 
Where  were  the  need  of  any  egohood 
(Call  it  a  soul,  God,  immortality : 
My  theory  or  Fichte's,  who  may  care  ?) 
All  undiscursive  of  an  universe  ? 
What  were  the  want  of  some  imperative 
Of  conscience  nowise  presentational, 
Bearing  no  reference  to  a  world  of  selves 
Of  equal  counter-obligation  ?    How 
Conceive  some  ultimate  antinomy 
Of  finite-infinite,  when,  to  this  new 
Presupposition  of  totality 
At  self-determination,  fmitude 
Or  absolute  infinity  alike 
Were  utterly  fallacious  ;  and  the  truth, 
The  essence-structure  of  the  system's  self, 
Were  some  infmitizing  of  each  fact 
By  comprehension  of  the  whole  in  each, 
Were  some  determinism  finite-wise, 
But  none  less  inferential  endlessly 
Of  the  universal,  of  the  unifaction 
Of  rational  appreciation  ?    Such 
207 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

A  faculty  of  judgment  doubtless  may 
Excuse  its  operation  from  the  law 
Of  abstract  concept  categorical 
Or  crass  modalities  of  logic-scheme ; 
Where  every  judgment  is  alike  of  form 
Inceptual,  mutualizing  (by  no  mean 
Of  class-subsumption,  no  identifying 
Of  entities  distinct  but  misdefmed 
By  the  inclusion  indiscriminant), 
Mutualizing  items  whose  whole  worth 
(Whose  worth  as  whole  and  finally  defined) 
Lies  in  their  implication  each  of  each 
Obversely,  by  polarity  of  like 
To  unlike  (by  appropriance  subjectwise 
In  contrast  to  the  world-rejectiveness 
Of  object),  reconciled  but  ne'er  confused 
In  the  judgment-deed,  the  effective  alterance 
Of  self  through  world,  the  conscious  ethicism 
Positing  both  which  otherwise  were  nought. 
Such  an  inherence  of  the  world  in  self, 
Self  in  the  world  establishing  its  truth 
By  absolute  experience,  were  perforce 
A  moralism,  an  insight  of  the  deed 
Determinant  interminably  through 
208 


KANT 

All  deeds  else  of  a  world's  infinity, 
And  hence  a  conscience  and  a  duty,  far 
Beyond  all  law-imposed  imperative, 
Establishing  for  law  what  well  may  seem 
Rule  universal  — '  Act  so  that  thy  deed 
'  Should  be  the  deed  of  all.'    For  thus  thy  deed 
(By  my  fresh  insight  of  the  world-permeation) 
Determines  universally  through  all 
A  novel  form  and  substance  unto  truth, 
Each  deed  itself  creative  of  a  truth 
Valid  by  absolute  conformity 
Unto  the  nature  of  the  cosmic  scheme, 
A  scheme  created  by  the  comprehension, 
The  evaluation  ultimate  express'd 
In  each  world-conscienced  act-experience 
Of  teleology  interminable 
(For  all  the  empiricism  of  our  sense) 
Through  space-in-time,  of  every  hour  and  place 
Wherein  we  move  and  have  our  being.    For  thus 
Are  space  and  time  no  mere  restrictive  forms 
In  limitation  of  the  thing-itself, 
But,  space  for  world,  time  for  the  subject-soul, 
Our  essence-being  and  the  truth  of  things 
Noumenal  as  perceptual,  sensuous 
209 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

As  intellectual ;  and  nought  were  beside 

Of  any  meaning  to  an  universe 

Of  individuation,  personal 

As  this  of  thine  and  mine  !  —  There,  Fichte,  thou 

Condemn  me  out  of  mine  own  mouth,  if  thou 

Wouldst  to  the  centuries  be  more  than  I ! 

But,  ah  !  what  standard  anywhere  of  truth 
Remains,  if  out  of  every  mouth  may  mouth 
Condemn  the  truth,  as  I  this  Fichte's,  he 
Mine,  as  myself  erstwhile  have  disapproved 
The  dogmatisms  heretofore  believed  ? 
Where  were  the  settlement  of  truth-dispute 
Fit  for  the  fond  old-age  of  such  as  me, 
To  comfort  and  console  for  many  a  doubt 
With  sense  of  some  real  goal  to  all  our  search 
And  standard  ultimate  for  test  and  proof  ? 
If  to  the  centuries  thou  wouldst  be  more 
Than  I,  or  I  than  thou,  must  there  be  more 
For  truth-criterion  than  this  strange-made  Self 
(Whate'er  its  restless  heart-conatus  toward 
Unceasing  criticism  cumulative !  ) 
Which  thou  hast  conjured  and  my  thought  hath 
won 

2IO 


KANT 

Unto  pale-gibbering  ghostliness,  myself 
As  that  false  seer  whose  disembodied  earth 
Shimmer'd  arcanawise  within  his  dreams  ! 
Ah,  Gottlieb  !  what  hast  thou  not  wrought  of  harm 
To  sane  and  serious  thinking ;  what  have  I 
Not  in  this  hour  brought  home  to  mine  own  creed 
Of  accusation  in  enormity  ? 
Descartes,  Spinoza,  Leibnitz,  none  did  this ; 
Locke,  Berkeley,  nay  —  save  as  a  Hume  was  in  them : 
And  we,  as  now  !   But  we  are  many  Humes, 
Powerful  as  our  disproofs  are  powerful 
Beyond  the  shallower  skepticism  to  slay, 
Slay  and  leave  nought  but  orphanage  to  earth  ! 
Cringe  we  not  both  convicted,  who  forsook 
The  safe  assumption  of  a  Deity 
Himself  accountable  not  unto  us 
Even  for  the  mystery,  the  antinomy 
Of  me  or  thee  striving  to  comprehend 
An  universe  ?  Struck  not  my  first  fond  blow 
The  shackles  from  our  dogmatisms,  to  lead 
Inevitably  to  the  loss  at  last 
Of  all  God  guaranteed  ?   My  criticism, 
My  feeling  for  the  soul's  formality 
And  earth's  phenomenality,  alas ! 
211 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Lifted  they  not  the  veil,  that  thou  and  I 

Have  enter'd  into  the  temple  and  are  there 

Godless,  deserted,  desolate  of  hope, 

The  great  destroyers  of  the  Word-Reveal'd, 

Thought-stultified  and  soul-ashamed  ?    What  faith 

Without  pretence  of  logic  can  abide 

The  very  skepticism  that  left  it  there 

A  mockery  unto  mine  own  insight 

When  stirr'd  to  quick  acumen  by  thy  crude 

Snatch  at  the  thunder,  by  thy  gross  conceit 

Of  innermost  omniscience  ?   Mine  old-age 

Hath  left  earth  somewhat  desolate  ;  thy  youth 

Hath  sow'd  but  dragon-teeth  of  discontent 

At  hard-won  orphanage  !   For  surely  we 

From  our  safe  dogmatisms  are  wide-awaked  : 

And  the  new  chaos  welters,  who  knows  where  ? 


212 


MRS.  BROWNING 

NO,  not  one  word  of  death  !   Though  here  I  die, 
These  songs  I  leave  thee.   And  they  are  my  life  !  — 

Love,  who  hast  given  me  hope  and  health  and  voice, 
Making  me  poet  in  mine  own  despite  ! 
Lurk'd  there  a  song  of  my  lips  till  thy  love  bid  me 
Onward  and  up  to  lift  my  heart  to  thine  — 
There  that  thou  stoodest  sole  yet  and  sublimely 
Where  no  soul's  song  save  mine  may  dwell  with 

thee  ? 

Surely  a  world  of  song  is  wholly  thine : 
Thine  isolate  sublimity,  no  lack 
Of  a  universe  to  love  and  call  thine  own. 
Yet,  thou  wast  wont  to  stoop,  to  lift  it,  so ! 
Till,  suddenly,  one  lift  more,  and  't  is  1 
Startling  my  spirit  to  its  fresh-found  depths 
With  peal  and  pasan  who  can  stand  with  thee  ! 
'T  is  the  right  woman's-work.   Where  thou  art  — 

well, 

Not  seraph-spotless  as  in  vaster  theme 
(Though  how  this  love  of  mine  at  least  did  mend 
Thy  music  to  that  song  of  Any  Spouse 
213 


POEMS   OF  PERSONALITY 

Whose  spotlessness  belies  me  where  I  lie !), 

Where  thou  wert  passionate  yet  conscienced  still 

Of  man  and  woman  as  a  man  must  be  — 

There  swells  the  wife-heart ;  and  the  Word  is  sung ! 

Shall  I  accomplish  thus  Aurora's  life 

In  mine  own  person,  complementing  man 

With  woman's  utter  passion-purity  ? 

What  though  Aurora  fail  as  poet-piece  ? 

It  manifests  a  mission  —  made  complete 

In  its  own  failure  by  these  Sonnet-things. 

These,  then,  my  song ;  my  voice  wrung-out  by  thee, 

For  thee  and  through  thee  unto  all  mankind  — 

The  love  that  springs  forth  naked,  unashamed  ! 

Love,  how  these  songs  live  at  the  heart  of  thee ! 


214 


CARLYLE 

I  GRIEVE  for  old  bereavement ;  long  alone 

I  seek  to  salve  my  sore  with  some  new  sight, 

Mine  own  gone  stale ;  I  seek  to  see  the  world 

With  eyes  of  others :  as  in  all  those  years 

Of  her  companionship  I  faiPd  to  find 

Hers  or  to  dwell  at  large  within  that  soul. 

Thus  much  hath  been  of  loss  irrevocable, 

Wholly  inexorable,  fix'd  withal  — 

Thus  much  of  her.   Let  me  not  quit  the  world 

Without  some  insight  of  the  younger  eyes 

To  bear  upon  my  grief ;  I  yet  preserving 

What  wisdom  hath  been  to  me  beyond  theirs : 

Not  losing  God,  perhaps  gaining  the  world 

In  some  way  yet  unguess'd.   Let  me  allow 

This  loneliest  unrest  to  expatiate 

Out  of  the  fulness  of  some  central  truth 

Ev'n  to  truth's  utmost  confines  —  how,  I  care  not ; 

But  yield  my  thought  to  the  flux,  all  unafraid.  — 

In  darkness  or  in  wisdom  struggling,  each, 
Centre  and  focus  of  immensity, 
The  confluence  each  of  two  eternities  : 
215 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

Each  soul  some  sign  of  the  infinite,  of  God  ! 
Thus  have  I  spoken ;  and  shall  stand  by  that ; 
Against  their  cant  of  atheism,  secure  : 
The  fulness  of  the  central  truth  withal ! 
And  what  though  this  be  pantheism  :  if  true  ? 
What  though  I  risk  mine  individual  self 
(And  with  that  self  all  hope  of  after-death  !)  — 
As  their  taunt  goes  —  if  God  alone  in  truth 
Be  the  truth,  and  there  be  no  self  beside  ? 
And  more  :  how  lose  a  self  if  in  some  sense 
(No  matter  how,  so  long  as  truth  it  be) 
That  self  be  infinite  and  find  in  God 
A  loftier  truth  that  yet  is  self  the  same  ? 
I  have  decried  this  truth  when  logic-woven 
Of  empty  metaphysic  subtlety 
Without  firm  faith -foundation ;  I  have  mock'd 
The  misty  opium-dreamer ;  scoff'd  at  him 
My  first  disciple  from  beyond  the  sea  — 
While  ever  haughtily  refusing  help 
Proffer'd  of  physic-fact's  stolidity. 
But  now  am  come,  fronting  the  physic-fact, 
Fearless  to  grapple  with  it,  reconstruct 
That  slough  utilitarian  to  truth, 
If  may  be,  builded  of  mine  Emerson 
216 


CARLYLE 

His  unforgotten  Godhood  of  the  soul ! 
I  have  examined  soul  and  find  it  so ; 
Seem  to  myself  assured  of  self-in-God. 
A  thought  to  stand-by,  utterly  sincere. 

But  why  asseverate,  asseverate, 
If  nought  be  to  gainsay  within  the  soul  ? 
If  all  the  conscious  cant,  hypocrisy 
Be  wholly  theirs,  be  none  at  all  of  mine, 
Why  vehement,  why  objurgatory  so 
Through  all  these  years  of  mine  accomplishment, 
With  irritation  of  internal  fret 
And  mental  pain,  as  though  some  lurking  rift 
Twixt  fact  and  faith  tortured  the  frenzied  brain  ? 
Why  is  it  that  the  question  hath  recurr'd 
To  the  same  condemnation  hour  by  hour  — 
Ever  the  same  —  if  there  be  not  a  doubt; 
If  detail  of  the  faith  (ay,  whether  worth 
Faith,  fit  to  be  believed  !)  never  demands 
A  re-adjudication,  if  to  stay 
Still  genuinely,  vitally  sincere  ? 
The  detail  of  my  faith  hath  varied  much  — 
Half  Calvin  I,  half  Fichte  !  — still  sincere  ? 
Am  I  alone  '  infallible '  of  men 
217 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

(Incapable,  that,  of  falsity  to  self), 
Whilst  doom'd  within  me  to  deny  as  't  were 
Myself,  denying  what  I  yet  feel  fact-like  : 
Ignoring  this  their  '  evidence  of  fact ' 
Which  so  gets  hold  of  me,  for  all  my  cry  ; 
Which  holding  me  compels  me  that  I  cry  ? 
How  may  there  be  that  everlasting  Yea 
I  prate  of,  an  there  be  no  Nay  as  real 
As  in  mine  adolescence  I  too  knew  ? 
Were  not  my  Yea  of  the  soul  just  Fichte's  Self, 
My  Calvinism  alway  so  bemock'd, 
Save  something  of  denial  by  a  world 
Be  the  world  and  give  God  a  meaning  still  ? 
What  if  the  evidence  of  fact  hath  truth 
And  earth,  as  earth,  be  godless  as  they  claim  it  ? 
Shall  that  destroy  me  ?   Shall  idealism 
Die  vehement  deploring  phantoms  lost  ? 
Stay,  put  this  case,  that  earth  lies  as  they  say 
Barren,  and  God  a  gas,  and  heaven  a  void, 
And  soul  some  tubercle  !   Shall  I  have  fear 
That  God  and  soul  cannot  by  ev'n  these  false-truths 
Triumph  and  turn  them  but  to  truth  the  more  ? 
'T  were  worst  hypocrisy,  self-sham  and  cant 
Longer  to  laugh  their  evidence  to  scorn 
218 


CARLYLE 

As  hitherto.   At  least  their  full  belief 
(Mistaken,  certainly  ?)  is  yet  some  fact 
For  me  to  face.   A  world,  of  many  men 
Half-one  with  God,  believes  there  is  no  God  : 
Within  God's  scheme  there  proves  a  place  for  such. 
Within  my  rede  (as  I  am  phase  of  God) 
Must  prove  the  same  place,  proved  as  it  shall  please 
God  to  give  value.  —  May  earth  be  as  godless ; 
And  God  yet  of  me  and  my  faith  be  His  ? 
A  search  for  truth  then,  utterly  sincere  !  — 

And  why  so  long  postponed  I  to  old-age 
This  search  for  truth,  if  utterly  truth-single 
At  soul  in  my  life's  labor  as  I  deem'd 
Of  prophet,  truth-seeker  ?   May  it  not  be 
Perchance  some  love  toward  what  most  apeth  truth 
(But  is  not  save  the  self  be  very  God 
And  very  worldless  as  by  Berkeley's  scheme), 
Zeal  for  conviction,  worst  unconscious-cant, 
Sincere-hypocrisy  (subtlest  demerit 
Of  Satan's  panoply  !)  that  hath  subdued  me  ? 
I  doubt,  then,  that  I  truly  have  loved  truth 
Despite  much  protestation.   I  have  loved 
Sincerity,  pre-requisite  soul  of  truth 
219 


POEMS  OF   PERSONALITY 

But  not  truth's  body,  forgetful  that  men's  faith 
Is  measured  also  by  the  emblem  of  it 
(The  Not-Self  of  that  Fichte,  and  the  'form 
'  Of  pure  perception  '  in  the  slang  of  Kant, 
Determinate-momenta  of  that  Hegel, 
As  the  babble  goes  !)  —  sole  warrant  of  the  mind 
Contra  mistake,  crass  insufficiency, 
Error  against  the  laws  of  world-in-God. 
Granted  God  doth  allow  of  varying  merit, 
The  less  or  more  of  truthful  worth  attained, 
The  achievement  characteristic  and  unique, 
The  stint  of  sight  —  each  heart  may  be  sincere 
In  force  of  sheer  belief  and  yet  unworthy. 
(How  self  may  be  so  —  that  is  for  research 
Of  some  far  future  soul,  the  final  problem 
Of  all  soul's  exercise  in  search  of  truth  — 
The  logic-law  of  error  —  I  may  not  seek  it ! ) 
What,  thus,  were  the  honest  fool  but  fool-sincere, 
A  fact  of  nature  scantly  valuable 
In  furtherance  of  truth  ?   And  I  have  praised  him 
Through  mine  intemperance  of  outcry  'gainst 
Mere  sham.   I  doubt  me  if  a  man  may  well 
(Even  myself  despite  this  hour's  first  fear !) 
Unto  himself  (the  last  appeal  ?)  be  sham ; 
220 


CARLYLE 

But  deem  him  mainly  earnestness  at  heart 
In  genuine  effort  to  delude  the  world 
At  worst,  at  best  not  to  delude  himself ; 
Even  I  at  worst,  ah,  to  myself  sincere  ! 
I  had  been  thus  far  sham-like,  fool-sincere, 
Incapable  of  answering  with  truth 
Unto  their  false-truth  wherewith  they  deny 
God,  immortality,  that  I  approved 
Nigh  any  ignorance  if  but  confident 
(Mine  own  admitted  ignorance  this  day 
Of  immortality,  the  lesson  of  it 
Illustrative  as  of  some  Fichtean  scheme, 
Some  Hegel's  subtlety  beyond  mere  dreams 
Of  Emerson,  of  Coleridge  and  his  crew, 
Found  in  the  facts  these  modern  men  mistake  — 
These  Darwins,  Huxleys,  Spencers,  and  the  rest 
For  counterproof,  and  I  till  now  ignored  !), 
Nigh  any  brutal,  raw  effrontery  — 
Of  Friedrich,  almost  of  Danton,  Marat  — 
Of  mind  or  manners  if  with  courage  of 
Its  brutishness ;  and  could  not  by  my  test 
Of  practical  conquest  over  force  opposed 
(The  right  of  might,  due  to  might's  truculence  : 
The  might  of  right  not  being  competitive  !) 
221 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

Have  logically  long  discountenanced 
The  physic-cohort.    (It  was  but  my  Ruskin 
That  warranted  the  counterclaim  of  '  power 
'  By  virtue  of  more  complex  understanding  ' 
And  spiritual  conclusion.)   I  felt  free 
With  arrogance  of  Calvinistic  zeal, 
While  yet  confessing  doctrines  of  God's  ways 
With  men  which  made  men  each  some  Absolute, 
To  spurn  contemptuous  a  fund  of  fact 
Rich  to  interpret  continuity 
Within  each  individual  self  as  source 
Of  both  eternities,  rich  to  prove  soul 
By  metabolic  impetus  of  will 
Ever  evolving,  rich  for  detaiPd  proof 
Of  the  ways  of  God-in-man  which  are  the  Hero 
And  are  my  heart's  religion.   I  thus  forgetful 
How  truth  is  half  a  doubt,  half  a  dismay 
At  that  which  truth's  new  being  oversets 
(The  God  ex  machina  of  Calvin  in  me !), 
The  truth  and  thing  outworn  :  because  the  o'er- 

setting 

Destroys  still  truth  and  is  that  brutal  fact 
Which  very  truth  is  not.   Whence  must  a  love 
For  truth  be  sadness  half,  half-insincere 

222 


CARLYLE 

And  saved  thereby  from  being  tyranny ! 
God  is  not  'in  His  heaven'  (yon  Browning  sings  it 
For  all  his  tragic  musings !)  save  the  soul 
Of  man,  regretful  of  Elysium  lost, 
Be  heaven  —  and  how  be  heaven  save  as  this  earth 
Is  freedom  and  omniscience,  absolute  power 
Unto  each  man  whose  insight  of  men  all 
Yieldeth  accommodation,  compromise 
In  practice,  as  by  infinite  interplay 
Of  conscience  —  Fichte  given  body  and  hands 
By  this  despised  (and  rightly  despicable 
In  its  own  sordid  dust-analysis) 
Material  hypothesis  —  reborn 
As  inward  force,  infinity  of  power 
In  self-conatus  —  dream'd  by  mere  Lamarck  ! 
Whence  must  belief  in  immortality 
By  soul's  new  proof  derived  out  of  the  earth 
(Earth's  continuity  of  constant  change 
Precluding  alteration  beyond  felt 
Identity  of  self  within  self's  span) 
Be  half  a  sadness  for  the  faith  outworn 
Of  personal  persistence  after  death  — 
This  personal  infinity,  once  proven, 
Of  each  least  conscious  spirit  in  so  far 
223 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

As  conscientious  of  the  facts  of  soul 

About  him  —  coextensive  with  his  truth  — 

Debarring  any  aftermath  of  death ; 

And  leaving  sad,  regretful  this  belief 

In  earth-borne  godhood  for  the  loss  at  best 

Of  heaven-and-hell  and  God's  machinery 

Of  retribution  or  unending  bliss. 

The  retribution,  bliss  without  an  end, 

Are  heroism  as  I  feel  it  in  me, 

The  comprehensive  rule  of  faith  in  self 

Avowing  rights  of  self  within  all  else 

As  source  of  mutual  duties.   Truth  is  such. 

I  clearly  have  inveigh'd  (beyond  best  wont 
Of  world's  great  truth-seekers)  against  untruth, 
And  have  been  thus  untrue  unto  myself 
In  the  sole  way  man  may  be  thus  untrue : 
Incapable  of  assimilating  much 
Which  dreary  atheism  (saved,  re-born 
In  the  Teuton's  mystery)  now  turns  to  mean. 
Could  I  but  greatly  retransform  in  me 
The  false  which  yet  in  other  minds  or  times 
Is  as  the  truth  (these  doctrines,  let  us  say, 
Of  transmutation,  teaching  the  loftier  scheme 
224 


CARLYLE 

Of  continuity  as  self-defining 

The  conscious  soul  coterminous  with  all, 

Hence  infinite  ! )  I  less  had  been  sincere-like, 

May  be,  (well  might  I  wax  wiser  by  that !) 

But  truthful  more  unto  the  universe 

Of  men  within  me  each  of  whom  speaks  truth 

And  acts  it  as  is  in  him  :  truthful  most 

Unto  divinity  that  each  man  is  — 

Each  comprehensive  of  the  selves  of  all. 

Thus  had  I  truliest  been  historian, 

As  poet,  not  fantastic  chronicler, 

By  artistry  (as  one  may  some  day  tell 

My  history  !),  each  puppet  speaking  forth 

Reflective  estimate  of  his  own  acts 

In  terms  of  my  best  insight  of  acts  all, 

Rather  than  act  (as  writ)  a  narrative 

Held  up  to  censure  by  my  private  creed  — 

He  unenlighten'd  in  his  own  estate. 

(I  ponder  that  and  find  that  it  is  so.) 

Then  had  I  seen  that  action  least  is  finite, 

Most  focus  of  the  eternal  by  most  conscience, 

Most  gradual  wisdom,  than  by  that  brute-born 

haste 

Of  swift  decision  bred  of  ignorance 
225 


POEMS   OF   PERSONALITY 

As  was  the  crass  way  of  the  cross 'd  of  old, 

As  is  the  way  now  of  the  tyrannous, 

The  self-assertive,  not  the  self-contain 'd  ! 

Then  had  I  offer'd  less  a  wail  of  protest, 

More  the  benign  construction  Goethe  knew 

As  god  unto  his  spiritual  realm  ; 

More  worshipping  the  truth  intrinsically 

(And  therefore  worshipful  as  no  mere  hero), 

However  overthrown  and  crush'd  by  force 

Of  crude  sincerity ;  and  therefore  more 

As  great  men  are,  fostering  not  deriding 

The  weaker  cause  :  myself  a  power  among  them, 

Chief  optimist,  upbuilder,  constituter 

In  spite  of  great,  wise  grief  over  things  lost 

Which  each  fresh  proof  destroys.   I  have  seen 

truth 

Destroyed  and  new  truth  ever  self -destroy 'd  ; 
Have  felt  and  made  men  feel  the  tragedy ; 
But  ever  as  by  that  prevalence  of  might 
Irrational,  for  right  no  substitute 
Save  by  some  stultification,  by  some  juggle 
Of  phrase  to  take  the  fact  for  proof  of  law 
(Withal  mistaking  the  real  moral-fact)  ; 
Thus  ever  as  dull  protester  (irony, 
226 


CARLYLE 

The  tongue  of  impotent  discontent !)  perceiving 
Not  that  best  protest  comes  by  best  constructing 
Advanceward  of  the  times,  not  turning  back. 
It  may  be  that  the  meaning  of  the  times 
Brings  a  belief  in  just  this  way  achieved  now 
(Despite  the  lawless  Law  of  Darwin's  creed) 
Of  individual  initiative 
(Not  tyrannous  dominance  by  force  sincere ; 
Not  purpose  of  some  mob  beyond  the  man  !) 
Proven  by  comprehension,  soul-conclusion 
Ensuant  on  the  shown  necessity 
Of  each  in  every  mutual  influence. 
It  may  be  that  the  petty  point-by-point 
Of  all  their  science  (those  benumbing  norms  — 
False  metaphor  for  Mill's,  for  Spencer's  dreams 
Of  metaphysic  systems  self-disguised 
And  therefore  feebler,  foolisher  than  most  — 
Belittling  man's  best  effort,  every  sweep 
And  lift  of  an  heart  their  theory  denies) 
Opens,  as  now  I  find,  a  splendor-proof 
Of  hyper-heroism,  divinity, 
In  this  world-constitution,  within  each 
Its  definition,  miscall'd  consequence. 
I  '11  not  inveigh  against  pettiest  proofs 
227 


POEMS  OF  PERSONALITY 

(I  catch  me  in  contempt  nevertheless, 
Maugre  this  hour's  avow'd  Catholicism  !) 
Of  utilization  in  the  general  scheme 
(I  leave  those  sand-wastes  to  the  Bentham-brood); 
But  show  the  standard  of  utility 
(Synthetic  source  of  value  by  insight 
Through  sympathy,  not  competition  with 
Desires  and  satisfactions  of  all  men) 
Mainly  this  personal  perception  of 
Evaluation  within  every  man  — 
Not  within  all  alike,  but  within  each 
In  sort  by  terms  yet  individualwise 
Distinctive,  not  less  infinite  thereby, 
Because,  respective  in  their  private  kind 
And  grade,  conclusive.   Something  of  this  at  heart 
I  spake  of  several  in  whose  half -success 
I  found  some  warrant  of  divinity 
(Mahomet,  Dante,  Luther,  and  of  him 
Misjudged  by  name  of  Cromwell)  —  them  I  loved 
And  felt  at  one,  contributors  to  use 
Upbuilt  within  my  soul  as  theirs  in  furtherance 
Of  '  God's  will ' :  rather,  of  that  sympathy 
Which  clothes  increasingly  our  passion-frame 
With  moderation  as  a  garment,  pity 
228 


CARLYLE 

And  acquiescence  unto  other  wills, 
By  knowledge  of  their  faith  soul-absolute 
Conforming  self  unto  its  world  of  selves ; 
Each  in  its  lonely  sort  a  world  by  insight ! 

Then  to  the  recognition,  reconstruction ; 

To  find  it  very  helpful  at  the  last 

Unto  the  old  man  ruthlessly  bereaved  : 

Their  crazed  material  hypothesis  — 

Toward  God-in-the-world  (not  merely  by  example 

Through  history,  but)  by  continuity, 

By  self-necessitation  of  world-knowledge 

Truth-cumulative  in  the  temporal  stream 

Enveloping,  involving  '  to  the  end ' : 

By  worldhood-needed  such  a  knowledge  shown 

Focus  of  both  eternities ;  some  sign 

Of  life  immortal  in  and  of  itself 

As  each  is  self  —  though  all  the  world  shall  pass. 

Ah  me !  but  the  bereavement :  I  alone ! 


229 


CAMBRIDGE  .  MASSACHUSETTS 
U    .    S    .   A 


••.     r  ' 


U.C.BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


CDSD6DS73D 


185461 


